December 5th, first night in Havana, Centro Historico.

Ruth had to wait forever for my luggage.
The cab ride to the Hotel Florida took about 45 min - 20 Euro. Fugettabout US Dollars - they are not accepted. Euros are OK, but most commonly used are Pesos Convertibles. They are worth about 20-times the regular currency and you can get them at the official exchange offices.


The hotel is great! You enter trough a huge door and straight ahead is a wonderful courtyard with nice garden furniture and lots of plants. Very relaxing. Ruth had booked us a Junior Suite which is the size of a two bed room apartment - about 40 sqm. High ceilings, marble flooring,  “Cuban” furniture, amazing bathroom - just beautiful! Both the bedroom and the sitting room
have little balcony with wooden shutters. Very romantic! (Ruth wrote this...). See pictures of hotel Florida here.

The hotel is right on Obispo - one of the main shopping streets. Since Havana is a bit dark at night and we did not know our way around yet we just wandered up the street to the El Floridita, which is a comfortable bar Hemingway style - the home  of the daiquiri. We soon realized that Ruth was in need of food - the daiquiri did their thing quite fast. So we walked back on Obispo and stopped at the Hotel Ambos Mundos. Besides being a wonderful hotel they have a roof garden with nice garden furniture, lots of plants and an amazing view. There was even Cuban live music. Being a Buena Vista Social club fan and having been warned about the music Ruth was positively surprise not to recognize even one song :-)

We had a wonderful meal: Fruits as a starter - which was a disappointment.Neither the pineapples nor the oranges where especially tasty considering the fact that we are in the Caribbean.  But the red snapper with vegetable was amazing. They had offered French fries with it and I asked if we could have regular potatoes with it. The waiter confirmed this and when the food
arrived they had cut the potatoes in cubes and fried them :-).
I tried the Ambos Mundos an orange drink why consisted out of rum and a fruit juice - I need to practice with the alcohol! The entire meal was 32 CDO. See pictures of the rooftop terrace here.

Back in our hotel, Christof fell asleep at 9 PM and Ruth watched the stars while laying in bed along with the Cuban music in the background... A dream...unless you can not sleep with noise :-).
(Christof enjoyed the noise from the nearby parking lot the next morning at around 5 AM).

Things we noticed:

•Havana is cleaned every night, it seems they use lots of soap for that, since the streets are very slippery in the morning.

•They have ice cream - it seems that some Italians have made it over.

•Cubans rarely accept US Dollars - just like our friend Regina told us. So we had to change them in a bank which was no problem at all.

•A walk in Havana at night is sometimes spooky but very nice - do not be afraid. At no time were we worried about our safety.

•Centro Historico is very romantic, peaceful and there is music everywhere. Just make sure you
really know your way since part of this romantic feeling is not to many streetlight. (Christof missed that part)