Chapter 25: Twenty-nine in Trinadad

The next day, which also happened to be my birthday, I ventured out at 5 in the morning to fetch my parents from the Varadero airport and whisk them off to Trinidad. Trinidad is a very beautiful town with ancient cobbled streets and quaint colonial buildings, it also sports a very lovely white sand beach just an 8 dollar cab ride away. We arrived at the bus stop and a row of casa particular owners were waiting in a neat line behind a rope trying to get the business of the new arrivals.

I had been warned by a woman in Havana that booked us the casa that there was a common scam where people are intercepted at the bus station and taken to different casas than the ones that they actually booked – with the story that the place they booked made an error and was full – but really they are just scammers out to steal all your stuff – or at least your payment for the night’s stay. When we arrived what I thought was our casa particular owner met us at the bus stop with my name on a sign – but when we were taken to a different address than the one I had written down – I became suspicious and demanded to be taken to the proper address – the owner tried to explain that the other house was full at which point I became even more suspicious. I got to the house of the casa we had booked and confirmed and the owner said that yes indeed they were full – I asked why she had said they could accommodate me in the first place and she went on with a lengthy story about what had happened and I told her about my concern about the scam, and my disappointment in being put in another location without first being consulted, and in the end she concluded that we could stay there.

Once we had gotten our stuff moved in she was kind enough to explain to me about how annoyed the other casa owner was since he had come to the station to meet us and I explained back how if someone had explained what was going to happen things could have gone much more smoothly, but that we felt very bad to have let down the other casa owner and were just reacting in a chaotic situation, and that we were very sorry that he was put out, and after enough apologizing she changed her tune and said that these things happen. Once settled in we wandered out in search of food and sights. We wandered the streets for a while and went for an excellent dinner at a paladar with dirty table cloths but tasty food. The following day we hit the beach – and what a beautiful beach it was – with white sand and blue water and much more loveliness than I had every expected – we walked to the end of the beach and back again, picked out a shady spot under a palm tree – and relaxed until it was time to go and meet our cab driver. We had a little driving tour back into Trinidad with a quick pass through a cute little fishing village called La Boca.

Quaint little street in Trinidad

Scoping out the evenings entertainment options

the beach near Trinidad

Birthday dinner at a very good paladar in trinidad

Breakfast in the courtyard at our casa particular

View from a church tower

different view, same church tower

We got cleaned up back at our casa particular, went begging at the hotel to get some money changed (since all the exchange offices were closed) and then, went out in search of somewhere to eat. After an intentional scenic detour and an unintentional lost detour we arrived at another palladar and waited in line for twenty minutes before getting seated at a very short table and getting served a very tasty meal of fish for me, and lamb for my parents, then we took in a brief musical spectacle before heading home to bed. We rose early the next morning to catch the bus back toward Havana. I let my folks off the bus in Havana (hoping they would make it to the casa particular a-ok) and continued on to the cute little town of Vinnales another three hours down the road.