Even though, it’s fun to immerse ourselves into the Cuban culture, there are still tourist attractions that need to be seen while we’re here. Tuesday, we visited the National Tobacco Factory where we got to see the step by step process of how the famous and unattainable (for Americans) Cuban cigars are made. It was interesting to hear all about the process and even better to see the workers actually doing it all by hand. We also learned that the tobacco worker makes three times the national average salary, something very rare in a socialist country. At the end of the day the number of salable cigars are counted and the number of mistakes are subtracted to determine how much money they have earned. There are also only 17 workers in the whole country who are trusted to roll the most famous Cuban brand, Cohiba. The brand uses high quality leaves with extra flavor to give them their unique taste.
We also learned that although variations in cigar color are normal, cigars are boxed according to color in order to make them more visually appealing to the consumer.
The Cuban national capitol was designed by the same person who designed Madison’s city capitol and they are remarkably similar:
It isn’t used anymore so it was open for exploration:
Outside of the capitol, I saw a pink convertible taxi and immediately fell in love. I wanted it to keep it forever but had to settle on just a few minutes in the driver’s seat.
We also checked out the Museo de Bellas Artes to see original works by Cuban artists:
Tired and hungry, we stopped at one of the fancy hotel restaurants to split a pizza. Even though it was $10, it was enough to feed two and a good supplement to the bread and peanut butter we’re making a big part of our diets.
The night ended with a bottle of wine and some people watching on our balcony.
Sean in DC says
This looks like an amazing trip. I have such a romanticized view of what it would be like to visit kooba, between the food, the music and the people. I imagine this perfect snapshot of a once thriving country just frozen in time back in the 60s. Has it delivered any kind of experience like that for you? Please please please share as much as you can about your experiences there. I’d love to make a visit someday soon myself and really enjoy reading about yours.
Oh, and if I made any references to anything you think might get you in trouble, feel free to let me know and I’ll repost the comment without it.
Thanks!
RunningBlonde says
Hey Sean! It’s exactly like that. It felt like walking onto a movie set every time we walked out our door! I have a TON more stories and photos coming. We were there for over two weeks and this isn’t even the end of the first week yet! You should definitely go! It was very easy getting there via Cancun and completely worth it.