Cuba

February, 2015
Cuba

There is a small bridge just outside of Hemingway marina. The bridge is crumbling and painted blue. It spans a rotten canal of driftwood and trash and reeks of the dead dogs that were killed on the highway and thrown into the water. From the bridge you can see the local marina full of small fishing boats in varying degrees of repair. The most useable of them are not more than ten feet in length with a tiny cabin on the bow that a person can squat down and avoid the waves that crash over the bow when the boat is out trolling the steep drop off that runs along the northern coast of Cuba.

I watch the little boats climb the waves in the morning and dip down and disappear into the lulls between the crests. The water around Havana are incredibly deep and the waves are forced up by walls of coral and spit angrily before smashing into the manmade break walls. There is very little room for error in these waters.

Because the water drops off so fast it is possible to catch tuna and wahoo from these boats. You can purchase the fish from the fishermen in the afternoons.

Once, when I was walking along the road I saw a young man on an old motorbike pull up behind an old man on a delivery tricycle. As they approached a moderately steep incline in the road, the old man waved for the motorbike to pull around but the motorbike did not pass. The young man extended his right foot and pressed it against the back of the tricycle and pushed the old man up the hill. When they reached the crest of the hill the young man took his foot off of the tricycle and the old man touched the brim of his hat.