On Thursday, AL and I rode in a '57 Chevy with Papo's nephew Eric to the Cueva de San Tomas. Unfortunately, the guide was not there...he was on vacation. Hey, everybody should have a vacation. So then our plans changed and we decided to go to the Cayo Jutia beach. It was a long drive and the road wasn't very good. Cubans don't give much space to pedestrians or other vehicles and it can be a bit unnerving. I guess I'm also a bit gunshy because I've been the passenger in accidents in Taiwan, China, and then someone I knew dying in a car accident in Mexico. The first dead body I ever saw was a traffic accident in Taiwan. In my area, we give pedestrians wide berth and veer into other lanes to completely make sure. But in Cuba, they roll right up on a person's side, even when the other lane was completely empty.

Anyways, the beach was way cleaner than Playa del Este and had a lot less people. But for me most importantly...I didn't see SHIT floating in the water. I'd forgotten, but tropical storms just will run up on you. It will be nice and clear...and then some dark ass clouds will roll in and dump massive amounts of rain on you. We left when the storm came with it's lightning and thunder. It seemed the right time to go. As we were driving through the downpour and the driver and his buddy are wiping down the fog in the window, I had a moment of temporary panic. But then I told myself who drives better in the rain than people that drive in the rain all the time. Plus we were in a big old school American car and there weren't many cars in the road.

On our way out we got stopped at a checkpoint and a cop gave Eric a ticket because he wasn't supposed to be taxing us aruond. This was the first time that I'd seen a Cuban argue with the police. Eric was by no means being aggressive, but he was definitely pleading his case. I've seen locals stopped in Cuba all the time, but they were all very deferring. I thought it was weird that we had to carry around a passport to the beach, but now I understood why. Cops are always stopping people for whatever reason.

The best time we've had in Cuba has been in Vinales. The family we stayed with are incredible and a very loving family. You can't fake he way their kids are. To show our appreciation, we bought Papo a bottle of Ron Anejo Especial just the kind he said he likes. I also left a lot of pens with Magali because she's a teacher, her sisters are teachers, and the kids could definitely use them. Our next step was back to Havana and then to Cancun.