Travel Guide

Places To See

Cabaret Turquino

If you want a classy but affordable cabaret show, look no further than the Turquino. Popular bands (including Los Van Van) play here regularly, and the views are spectacular. Locals swear by this place.

Don Cangrejo

Perched strategically on the rocky shores of Miramar, this unique seafood restaurant is run by the Ministry of Fisheries and scores high points for atmosphere and service. Fresh fish dishes include red snapper, grouper and prawns, and there's lobster plucked from the pit on the terrace. Add to that a pool table and swimming pool, an inexpensive pizza-and-grill menu, and one of Habana's classic signs out front, and you can't go wrong.

Bim Bom

The famous Coppelia isn't Cuba's only ice-cream institution. Somewhere down the list in the 'not-half-bad' category is Bim Bom, an islandwide helado (ice cream) chain that serves a deliciously creamy version of the stuff in flavors such as coffee, condensed milk, and rum and raisin. Try it and see.

Museo de la Revolución

Habana's largest and most definitive museum is housed in the former Presidential Palace, constructed between 1913 and 1920 and used by a string of cash-embezzling Cuban presidents, culminating in Fulgencio Batista. The world-famous Tiffany's of New York decorated the interior, and the shimmering Salón de los Espejos (Room of Mirrors) was designed to resemble the room of the same name at the Palace of Versailles.

The museum itself descends chronologically from the top floor, starting with Cuba's pre-Columbian culture and extending to the present-day Socialist regime. Much emphasis is placed on the plethora of US plots against the island, along with the achievements of the revolution. The downstairs rooms have some interesting exhibits on the 1953 Moncada attack and the life of Che Guevara. Most of the labels are in English and Spanish. In front of the building is a fragment of the former city wall as well as an SAU-100 tank used by Castro during the 1961 Battle of the Bay of Pigs. In the space behind the museum you'll find the Pavillón Granma, a memorial to the 18m yacht that carried Fidel Castro and 81 other revolutionaries from Tuxpán, Mexico, to Cuba in December 1956. The pavilion is surrounded by other vehicles associated with the revolution and is accessible from the Museo de la Revolución.

Real Fábrica de Tabacos Partagás

One of Habana's oldest cigar factories and certainly its most famous, this neoclassical Habana landmark was founded in 1845 by a Spaniard named Jaime Partagás. Today some 400 workers toil here for up to 12 hours a day, rolling such famous cigars as Montecristos and Cohibas. As far as tours go, Partagás is the most popular and reliable factory to visit.

Tour groups first check out the ground floor, where the leaves are unbundled and sorted, before proceeding to the upper floors to watch the tobacco get rolled, pressed, adorned with a band, and boxed. Though interesting in an educational sense, the tours here are often rushed and a little robotic, and some visitors find they smack of a human zoo. Still, if you have even a passing interest in tobacco, Cuban work environments or economies of scale, it's probably worth a peep.

Museo del Ron

Even for teetotalers, this intriguing museum is worth a turn. The interesting bilingual guided tour shows rum-making antiquities (check out the funky terracotta flask), and explains the entire brewing process, from cane cutting to quaffing amber Añejo Reserva in the museum's tasting room. The scale model of the Central La Esperanza sugar mill factory, with working train, is very cool. The dancing lessons here are some of the best in Habana.

Catedral de San Cristóbal de la Habana

Dominated by two unequal towers and framed by a theatrical baroque facade designed in the style of Italian architect Francesco Borromini, Habana's graceful Catedral de San Cristóbal was once described by Cuban novelist Alejo Carpentier as 'music set in stone'.

Pope John Paul II said one of his four Cuban Masses at the cathedral in January 1998 during a groundbreaking papal tour of the island.

When the Jesuits began construction of the church in 1748, Habana was still under the ecclesiastical control of Santiago de Cuba. Work continued despite the expulsion of the Jesuits from Cuba in 1767, and the diocese of Habana was finally created when the building was finished in 1787. A year later the city became a bishop's seat, elevating the church to a cathedral - one of the oldest in the Americas. Legend has it that the cathedral contained a dramatic funeral monument dedicated to Christopher Columbus, which held the great explorer's remains. It's said that the monument was shipped to Spain in 1898, where it is interred in Seville's cathedral.

One of the cathedral's many curiosities is its surprisingly austere classical interior, the work of a pious bishop at the beginning of the 19th century. To take a peep at the pews and altar your best bet is to slip inside during Sunday Mass.

Capitolio Nacional

Habana's most grandiose building, the Capitolio is similar to the US Capitol Building in Washington, DC, but taller and much richer in detail. It was initiated by Cuba's US-backed dictator Gerardo Machado in 1926 and took 5000 workers three years, two months and 20 days to build at a cost of around 17 million. Once the seat of the Cuban Congress, it now houses the Cuban Academy of Sciences and the National Library of Science & Technology.

Constructed with white Capellanía limestone and block granite, the entrance is guarded by six rounded Doric columns atop a staircase that leads up from Paseo de Martí. A stone cupola rising 62m and topped with a replica of 16th-century Florentine sculptor Giambologna's bronze statue of Mercury looks out over the Habana skyline. Directly below the dome is a copy of a 24-carat diamond set in the floor. Highway distances between Habana and all sites in Cuba are calculated from this point.

The entryway opens up into the Salon de los Pasos Perdidos (Room of the Lost Steps), so named because of the room's unusual acoustics. At the center of the salon is the 'Statue of the Republic,' an enormous bronze woman standing 11m tall and representing the mythic guardian of virtue and work.

Tours of the Capitolio are well worth the small fee.

Taberna de la Muralla

Set up by an Austrian company in 2004, this unique no-nonsense drinking establishment serves smooth, cold homemade beer at sturdy wooden benches set up outside on the cobbles or indoors in an atmospheric beer hall. Get a group together and the staff will serve the amber nectar in a tall plastic tube; you draw the beer out of a tap at the bottom. There's also an outside grill here where you can order good helpings of chorizo, fish and kebabs.

Get a group together and they'll serve the amber nectar in a tall plastic tube which you draw out of a tap at the bottom. There's also an outside grill here where you can order good helpings of chorizos, fish and kebabs.

Bosque Bologna

A fern-filled terrace that fills the space of a demolished building on Calle Obispo, the Bologna is always busy with drinkers and diners drawn in by a combination of its effervescent music and highly persuasive waiters. It's a perfect warm-up for an extended Habana Vieja bar crawl.

Café Habano

A gritty, no-nonsense coffee bar, frequented mainly by Cubans, the Habano serves sweet, strong early-morning café cubana that gets plunked down straight in front of you on the bar. Don't expect anything fancy like here like, um, milk.

Events

The Havana Carnival in late February and early March features parades in front of the Capitolio or along the Malecón on Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings. The Havana International Jazz Festival happens every second year in February. Every other year, the International Guitar Festival gets strumming in May. The Festival of Caribbean Culture is celebrated in June or July, while the International Theatre Festival is held every other September. October has the 10-day Havana Festival of Contemporary Music as well as the Havana Ballet Festival later in the month. The International Festival of New Latin American Film screens every December. Christmas Day has been observed as a public holiday since the Pope's visit in 1997. The Havana Book Festival takes place each year in February.

Pre-Departure Information

Electricity

110/220V

60Hz

Electrical Plugs

European plug with two circular metal pins

Japanese-style plug with two parallel flat blades

American-style plug with two parallel flat blades above a circular grounding pin

Weather Information

Havana, like the rest of Cuba, has two kinds of weather: hot and really, really hot. In July and August most of Havana goes on vacation to escape the sultry heat, which is bolstered by the humidity. The rainy season runs from May to October, overlapping with the hurricane season, which is generally from June to November. Havana can very occasionally be affected by cold winds from the North American interior, causing a day or two of temperatures below the 10°C (50°F) mark. Bring warmer clothes for the evenings if you are visiting at this time of year - it's colder than you think.

History and Culture

Pre-20th Centure History

Havana was established at its present harbour mouth location in 1519 after a couple of failed attempts on nearby swampy land squelched into insignificance. The town's remoteness made it an unpopular choice for Cuba's administrative centre, but it was a perfect gathering point for the annual treasure fleets bound for Spain from Mexico and Peru. Havana became the front door to the vast Spanish colonial empire and in 1607 the capital of Cuba was officially moved here.

When Spain became embroiled in the Seven Day War between Britain and France in 1762, Britain celebrated by seizing Havana, hanging on to it for 11 months and then exchanging it for Florida. The reclaimed Havana was then turned into the most strongly fortified city in the New World. It was also allowed to trade freely, developing and growing steadily through the 18th and 19th centuries. The city was physically untouched by the devastating wars of independence in the latter half of the 18th century, making Havana easily the finest surviving Spanish complex in the Americas.

Modern History

When alcohol was made illegal in the US by Prohibition, Havana (a mere 145km/90mi jaunt from the now painfully dry Florida shore) blossomed sickly sweet into a haven for the party-centric jet-set, Mafiosos on a mission and anyone in the mood for good rum, a fine cigar and some delicious salsa music. Luxury hotels like the Capri and the Nacional sprang up against the tropical sunset and Havana's wide streets flowed with polished chrome-and-steel beauties from Detroit's most expensive automotive lines. The party was over on New Year's Eve 1959, when rebels led by Fidel Castro marched into town and announced that prostitution, gambling and other services offered by those eager to earn a tourist dollar would be replaced by advanced medical technology, a literary and artistic renaissance, and some good, old-fashioned Soviet-style hard work. Racial segregation was outlawed, Havana's upper classes headed for Miami, and the starry-eyed rebels gave the construction of a socialist utopia their best shot. Results were mixed at best, and the city remains in truly dire need of a new paint job.

Nearly 100 homes were destroyed in Old Havana when Hurricane Georges rolled through the country in September 1998. Luckily, few people suffered injuries and the city fared much better than the storm-battered eastern half of the island.

Recent History

Thanks to laws allowing more private businesses, farmer's markets and other enterprises long banned by the socialist government, Havana is coming into its own as a world-class capital, and all the problems - prostitution, crime and drug-trafficking have made comebacks, despite the government's best efforts at maintaining law and order. Nightclubs, fine dining and cultural monuments draw thousands of visitors each year. The international success of Cuban artists, writers and musicians, particularly those hailing from the Buena Vista Social Club, add an even more colourful patina to this increasingly cosmopolitan and unabashedly lovely city. In 2005 Hurricane Wilma hit Havana with a bang. Many parts of the central district were flooded while already dilapidated buildings on the Malecon teetered a little closer to complete collapse. Recovery was swift. Many of Havana's popular hotels were converted into staging posts for foreign patients participating in the groundbreaking 'Mision Milagros' campaign, offering technically advanced eye treatments to disadvantaged people arriving from Venezuela, Bolivia and other Latin American and Caribbean countries.