We had a great breakfast on the roof terrace with fresh bread, fruits, eggs, juice and cafe con leche. We then went to the city center to book an organized hiking trip for the next day. It’s a bit tricky to get to the trail heads by your own, so we decided we’d better go with a group. Point 1 for checklist done!
Next on the list was looking for two bikes that were in more or less good condition. Not as easy as you may think. Almost every casa offers bikes to rent, but often we were not very sure if these bikes would survive a 35 km ride. Or maybe the other way around, if our b…. would survive the ride. We followed one guy to his casa and checked out the two bicycles he had to rent. Tires were as usually under inflated, wheels were waved but overall was looking OK. We thought we could find better or cheaper. The second casa, recommended by the tour company, had some bicycles that “looked” newer. After a quick verification that brakes work, speed can be changed and there was a pump to solve the tire issue, we chose those. They ended up being heavy, but mine was really horrible, back derailer was bent, both pedals were excessively bent. We managed to get to La Boca and Playa Ancon using the crappy bicycle. Luckily the road was more a less flat and there were some slightly downhill parts. The landscape was beautiful, mountains in the back and next to us the sea shining in hundreds of different bluish colors. A beautiful and hot day – no time to think about the pain caused by Nico’s bike. But after the first 8 km we already needed to take a break as it was pretty hot.
Playa Ancon was a great place to swim and catch big waves if you want to.
It was 1 CUC to park both of our bikes.
The ride back almost destroyed by feet and knees. I exchange bicycle with Tina for the last 10 minutes. She understood after 2 seconds what I went through.
We brought back the 2 bikes, tried to negotiate the rental fee for the bikes, but no luck. We were jealous of all those who brought their own bike.
Back in Trinidad, we sat on the stairs of the beautiful Plaza Mayor for almost an hour, drinking our Mojito to go and watching the sunset. Gorgeous! On the way to the restaurant, we stopped in an art shop with hundreds of paintings from different Cuban artists. I found one, of large size, picturing a blue Plymouth from the 60s in the street of Trinidad. I bought it 25% under the requested price. I’m getting good at negotiation.
We found another restaurant listed in Lonely Planet where people signed their name on the wall. I was wondering how people managed to write 12 feet from the ground. We found a spot at a reasonable height of 7 feet to write our names and date. Why was everyone looking at us with a strange look while we were writing on that restaurant’s wall? 🙂 Are they not reading the travel guide???
This slideshow requires JavaScript.