Playa Larga

Yesterday we explored more of the Vinales countryside on horseback, just the two of us and our guide.

It was good fun although the horses looked tired and were very docile. Probably just exhausted. I think they work them quite hard.

Today we shared a taxi with a couple from NZ and are now in Playa Larga which is a small coastal village in the Bay of Pigs on the Caribbean Sea. So we swam in the Caribbean Sea after an absence of 32 years and washed away the grime of the journey.

The Bay of Pigs was the landing place for the USA sponsored invasion of Cuba in the early 1960s by anti-Castro Cubans trained and armed by the CIA. It was a miserable failure much to America's embarrassment. They never attempted a direct invasion again. It's a big bay and I stood on the beach today wondering where they might have landed. It's also an odd place to choose as it's surrounded by swamp so there's only one way out and that's along the road we came in on. I don't think they got far before Castro's army turned up and either killed or captured them all.

Our Casa is a little small but only 35yds from the beach and they are very friendly. The owner cooked us a fish supper - snapper, rice, salad, frites and fruit which was really tasty after the bland food at Vinales, and we are planning a few lazy days swimming and chilling on the beach.