I've been meaning to write up this post for a while, however it seems there is never enough time to write up the whole thing and generally I've just been lazy.

The first time I went to Cuba was when I was in grade 10. I didn't know much about the country, or about anything for that matter, I was just getting into photography, and was going on my first "vacation experience" type vacation, if you follow. Up to then I'd been on vacation to Florida, Muskoka, as well as other areas around the States and Canada. However it was never a full blown, don't worry about a fucking thing for a week type of deal. Cause you and I both know I had a lot to worry about in grade 10.

Those seven days were utopia. Our resort was in Cayo Coco, which is an island off Cuba and there were no locals on it. We did what we wanted, when we wanted and had nothing and no one to make us feel guilty about it, not that I'm implying that we should have, but the point remains none the less. When the day came for us to leave I hated it, and wished I could live the rest of my life in this aristocratic nature. Needless to say, that's not how it worked out. Fast forward to today.

First year university coming to an end and celebrations are in order, as with most firsts. Cuba... warm, all-inclusive, not to expensive, not dangerous, no crazy diseases or insects... I'm in. Well that's almost how it was. Long story short, school finishes, a couple of weeks pass, and were in the airport. With no problems or delays, we're on the plane* and in the air.
*Thought I'd mention that I love planes!
Anyways, the vacation went great as vacations should, although not always do. We swam in the ocean and lounged on the beach. The bar was never too far away, and on occasion someone would be sent for refills. Eventually we adapted, and started implementing trays into our drink fetching system, a lot more efficient that way. Night-wise our resort's disco wasn't top notch by any standard, but on a couple occasions it was filled up to a comfortable number of people and we got up and pretended to know how to dance. We were nothing compared to the girl dancing on the bar, but we tried. Other nights we spent sitting on the beach, without all the light pollution that comes from a large city, millions of stars a visible and allow for endless dreaming. One night we watched a thunder storm far off in the distance battle it out. On another occasion we all decided to try a Cuban cigar and one night we watched a fairly impressive magic show.

The highlight of the trip was a safari adventure that signed up for. This involved me learning to drive manual (it's not as difficult as everyone makes it out to be) as we were given small jeeps to go off-roading. These jeeps, which by the way had no seat belts, rear-view mirrors, working fuel gauges, or turn signals, were a means of transportation from one action packed adventure to another.

At first we off-loaded to a small boat yard / bar, which according to our guide served-up the best mohitos in Cuba... they were pretty good. We also got small boats and went and a small tour of some river, and got to go for a swim half way through. After that we drove some more to some rocky shore where we went snorkeling, no pretty fish but there were some impressive underwater canyons. Next we drove to what used to be a coffee bean plantation, there we had lunch, as well as got to ride horses! Continuing on in our jeeps our final stop was a large cave, which had a natural spring. This was really awesome, the water was crystal clear and also very cold. But we got to try out our diving skills. Through out all this time we had also driven through various villages, giving us some insight in to the rural way of life, which is very poor to say the least.

Another excursion that we decided to take was a trip into town, to shop around the local markets. This showed us city life which although slightly better than the country was still really poor.

All in all it was a great trip, I no longer see Cuba as the oasis I once did, however I think one could get used to the local's way of life.

To see my photos from Cuba click here.