About Baron Reznik Image Licensing
Antarctica Bhutan Cambodia China Greenland Japan Mongolia Namibia North Korea South Korea United States
Reviews Selfie Sticks
Destinations Articles Travel Guides

The ASP Guide To Cuba

Are you ready to travel to a country that's felt the weight of a U.S. imposed embargo for over 50 years? There's not many places where you can travel and feel like you've just gone back in time (North Korea being another notable destination), but the flood of classic American cars and the lack of ubiquitous wireless internet will definitely help transport you to the Cuba of today.

I'll be updating this guide from time to time and as I get questions, so feel free to ask away in the comments below!

Who Can Travel To Cuba?

Well, pretty much anyone, but if you're an American things can be a bit hazy. Developments are happening rapidly, and I think it's only a matter of time before Americans can once again freely travel to Cuba as they can any other country. Until then though, as an American you can travel on a "People-to-People" tour, which is a legal and pricey means of traveling to Cuba. There's still some confusion and uncertainty in what may constitute legal travel to Cuba given the Obama administration's changes in January 2015. Basically, people that were previously allowed to legally travel to Cuba under a specific license are no longer required to obtain the specific license, but you are still required to meet the classification criteria for that license.

There's 12 categories in which special licenses apply, such as "Journalism", "Education" and "Healthcare", but that doesn't mean anyone can just say "Oh, I'm going to Cuba as a Journalist" as you are actually required to have past professional experience (e.g. you've been paid to work as a journalist before) in the field. If you want to travel with the assumption you meet the criteria, I'd encourage you to google around a bit to better understand and see if this is the right choice for you. The reality is, enforcement of this may now be a bit lax, but you don't want to be the poor soul that gets the short end of the stick when re-entering the U.S. Another good way to mitigate this risk is to apply for Global Entry if you don't yet have it.

People-to-People Tours

If you're American and want to go the fully legal route, this is your best option. You will, however, pay a premium to go on a people-to-people tour compared to other options. On the up-side, you have easier access to charter flights originating from Miami and perhaps a few other select cities, which may make travel easier for you depending on where you're located. There's a number of operators that operate in this fashion, and while some operators like NatGeo may provide a value-add of having a photographic expert join the tour, you should know that there are only two tour operators in Cuba. That means, regardless of what operator you book your tour through, you're going to end up on the same buses, with the same tour guides, and overall same quality regardless of who you book your tour through. What does this mean? Going with the cheaper option is likely your best bet.

Some operators that provide legal, people-to-people tours:

In Touch With Cuba is, from what I've heard, the cheapest option around, although I have not tried any of these operators for myself, so you'll still want to check reviews of them on a site like TripAdvisor.

El Capitolio, the National Capitol Building in Havana.

How To Travel To Cuba Without A License

This is the far cheaper and flexible option if you're an American, however depending on your situation it is potentially illegal. It's also the route I chose for my own trip, which worked out just fine. You'll basically have your normal tour options, ranging from fully packaged tours to à la carte options.

Fly Through A Third Country

Probably the easiest way, is to fly through a gateway city. Since I'm on the west coast, I found the flight timings actually worked out to be a little more convenient to fly through Mexico as opposed to a people-to-people tour, most of which originate in Miami. I saved having to spend a night in Miami in a fancy hotel just so I could be on a charter flight to Cuba. Going through Mexico saved me a lot of time and money. You can find flights to Cuba from Mexico City, Cancun, Bahamas, Panama City and Canada as well as several other cities if you're not flying from the U.S.

Booking Your Flight

For me, I ended up booking my own round trip ticket to Mexico and then used a travel agency to book the round trip ticket from Mexico to Havana. If you're American, it's starting to get a bit easier to find and book your own flights to Cuba, but mostly they go through a third country. The online flight search engines (Kayak, Hipmunk) are starting to display flight options for Cuba, but their options are limited and booking them can be problematic. Here's some resources to help get you started:

View from the Hotel Inglaterra, the oldest hotel in Cuba.

Flights To Havana From Mexico City

Note: Flight times may vary depending on daylight savings time and airline scheduling.

  • Cubana (CU 131): Wed-Mon, MEX @ 08:45 - HAV @ 12:15
  • Cubana (CU 130): Wed-Mon, HAV @ 06:00 - MEX @ 07:45
  • Aeromexico (AM 451): Daily, MEX @ ~10:15 - HAV @ 14:10
  • Aeromexico (AM 452): Daily, HAV @ 15:20 - MEX @ 17:27
  • Aeromexico (AM 453): Mon/Wed/Sat/Sun, MEX @ 16:00 - HAV @ 19:55
  • Aeromexico (AM 454): Mon/Wed/Sat/Sun, HAV @ 21:03 - MEX @ 23:09

Flights To Havana From Cancun

Note: Flight times may vary depending on daylight savings time and airline scheduling.

  • Cubana (CU 153): Daily, CUN @ 16:05 - HAV @ 18:25
  • Cubana (CU 152): Daily, HAV @ 13:45 - CUN @ 15:05
  • Aeromexico (AM 447): CUN @ 11:02 - HAV @ 13:20
  • Aeromexico (AM 448): HAV @ 14:20 - CUN @ 14:41

Getting Your Cuban Visa

You'll need a visa (tourist card) to enter Cuba, but luckily the cost is relatively cheap at only 25 CUCs (~$28). If you're booking a tour, you can get one from your travel agent. You can also get one when booking your flight, or from the airport in a gateway city such as Mexico City.

The "Beyoncé" Suite at the Hotel Saratoga.

Hotels/Accommodation In Cuba

I booked my hotels in combination with some tour activities through A. Nash Travel. I was a little surprised to learn that my rooms were in fact booked through a Canadian hotel booking site, Sunwing.

Cuba does have a tiny experiment in capitalism where individual home owners with a special license from the government can rent their homes out, which is known as a Casa Particular. It's definitely more affordable than a hotel room, and now, many of these same casas can be found on Airbnb. You do have to be American if you want to use Airbnb in Cuba, but from what I've heard many casa particular owners list their homes at much higher rates on Airbnb than through other means.

Booking Sites:

Currency

There's two different currencies in use in Cuba, which doesn't help to simplify things. Generally, as a tourist, everything will be priced in Cuban Convertible Pesos (CUC), pronounced like "kooks" or spelled out as "C-U-Cs." The other currency in use is the Cuban Peso (CUP), which you might get from a street vendor, especially if you don't have the exact amount or a small enough denomination in CUCs, so be mindful of that when trying to buy small goods like water. In general, you want to avoid collecting CUPs as it'll be harder to use, and you'll need to have enough CUPs to convert them into CUCs, so you can in turn convert them back to another currency when leaving the country.

The CUC is pegged to the dollar, but if you try to exchange US Dollars for CUCs, there's a 10% tax applied. Convert at a hotel, and an additional 3% commission is taken. If you have or can convert to EUR, CAD, or GBP, without losing 10% the value, you'll be coming out ahead. If flying from the U.S. through a third country, that's an excellent time to withdraw some non-USD money from the ATM to then convert in Cuba, avoiding the 10% tax.

Now, this is important: Make sure you bring enough hard currency with you to last throughout your trip. You don't necessarily need to convert it all up-front, but the likelihood of you being able to use your credit card or an ATM to withdraw money is limited. If you have a U.S. issued card, it's pretty much non-existent, even though relations are improving and some card issuers are allowed to do business in Cuba. So, plan to use cash throughout your trip. When possible, you might want to pay for things in advance with credit card so you earn your points/miles/etc... such as for hotels and pre-booked tours.

Internet/Wi-Fi Access

Don't. Count. On. It. Internet access in Cuba has historically been quite limited due to political reasons. Some hotels may have internet access, but will be confined to a lonely desktop computer. Personally, I avoid all public computers since I never know what software/spyware has been installed on them. You can expect to pay $6 CUC to $10 CUC per hour of internet access at hotels, and whether Wi-Fi or on a desktop, the speeds will be extremely slow (maybe 768kbps for an entire hotel) at best.

My stay at the Hotel Saratoga included unlimited Wi-Fi, which was a really nice perk! However, it was extremely slow. Good enough to get some e-mail across and a facebook update or two, but not much else. As of July 2015, the Cuban government announced public Wi-Fi in 35 spots across the country costing $2 CUC/hour, just don't expect the process to access the internet to be so easy like at your local Starbucks. A passport will be required to set up an account, and it's not clear to me how easy that will be for visitors.

Duty Free: What Can I Bring Back?

You might be surprised to learn this, but you can actually legally buy and bring back Cuban cigars and alcohol for personal use to the U.S. The CBP lays it all out, but the long and short of it is, you can bring back up to $400 in goods from Cuba, of which no more than $100 of that can be for alcohol and tobacco products (combined). There's also some limitations on total number of cigars (50) or cigarettes (200) you can bring back, and similar for liquor (1 liter), so be sure to check out the info on the CBP website to learn more.

When it comes to liquor, let me put on my Captain Obvious hat for a moment and just say that rum is the way to go. You can find rum from brands like Havana Club in airport duty free shops all over the world, but some rums are a little more difficult to find (although not impossible, depending on the country) outside of Cuba. Santiago de Cuba is the brand most Cubans referred me to time and again, saying it's the original Bacardi. Apparently, after the Bacardi family left Cuba in 1960 due to the nationalization of businesses, Santiago de Cuba rum popped up in its place, using the same recipe and distilleries. In some limited research I wasn't able to verify this, but numerous Cubans have all recommended it, and Cuba is basically the land of rum, so whether it's true or not, it's still an excellent choice of liquor.

As for the cigars? Well, I don't smoke, so I can't offer much guidance except that Cohiba (Fidel's preferred brand) and Montecristo are pretty darn famous. If someone offers to sell you cigars for cheap, such as a street vendor, chances are they're fake black market cigars which you should avoid. For genuine cigars, make sure you shop at the government-owned stores.

Recommended Videos

A couple of good movies I can recommend you check out before your visit. If you're not already familiar with the revolutionary icon you've probably seen on t-shirts, you should definitely check out Che. It was originally shown in two parts, but only the first part is relevant to Cuba with the second part being about Che Guevara's time in Bolivia. Thirteen Days is a dramatization about the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.

 

Related Posts

Featured
Havana Bay
Havana Bay
Read More →
The Cubans Of Old Havana
The Cubans Of Old Havana

There's a real charm to Havana. It's undeniable. Inescapable. That melting pot racial mix of complex colonial origins, the soulful musical vibe, deteriorating buildings and infrastructure everywhere you go. What you see vs what you really see and experience if you go. Perhaps, in five years, this Cuba will be gone. Replaced by the influx of foreign travelers as relations between the US and Cuba continue to thaw. Or perhaps, it will be as if nothing ever happened. The needle slowly moving towards progress while the charm of this island endures.

Read More →
I'll Get You Around Town
I'll Get You Around Town

It's a bit exciting to watch as Cuba and America restore ties. Each small development a new milestone. Earlier this week, the first US cruise ship docked in Havana since 1959. While only 700 passengers visited on the cruise, it's only a matter of time before Cuba prepares herself for the massive Caribbean cruise liners. I wonder, what do those passengers expect when they arrive in Cuba? I have to imagine, a good number of them may not be prepared for the current state of infrastructure there. It's not on par with other tourist destinations in the region, but it's not terrible either. While the roads may be bumpy, and the cars quite antique, it's still a lot better than other forms of transportation. I keep wondering, what will Cuba be like in 5 years if I go back again? Will I even recognize it after the American tourist invasion?

Read More →
The Tower Of Manaca Iznaga
The Tower Of Manaca Iznaga

What was once the tallest structure in Cuba? Why, this 45m (147ft) sugar plantation tower in the Valley of the Sugar Mills. Located just outside of Trinidad (no, not the Trinidad of Trinidad and Tobago fame), you pay a small fee and can climb to the top for panoramic views of the valley. There were just a couple of other tourists that stopped by while I was there. I got the feeling it's more a site that sees a trickle of tourists rather than a busload. While I did join a tour to get me from Havana to Trinidad and back with some sightseeing, there was a few hours free in the late afternoon to explore as you please. While most people seemed to head for the beach or the nearby streets of Trinidad, I opted for the more cultural destination with a taxi tour of a few spots I had wanted to check out. It was definitely a more relaxing, and intimate way to explore this sliver of the island before it is overrun with an influx of fellow American tourists.

Read More →
Under The Tree
Under The Tree

When it's 90 degrees out with 90% humidity, sitting in the shade is only second to actual a/c. It always amazes me how people that grow up in different parts of the world are so well adapted to it. The people that can live with 90F weather and not sweat. The sherpas that maintain their oxygen levels, even at altitudes above 14,000 ft. Well, not be. Music is something that is central to the culture of the island. Everywhere I went, I saw live music. In the bars. In the streets. People dancing in the streets and at bars at night. It's inescapable and it's a good thing. The beats might not be what you're used to hearing wherever you call home, but they're worth hearing.

Read More →
Curbside Classic
Curbside Classic

When walking around Havana, let alone pretty much anywhere else in Cuba, you can't help but run into a plethora of classic American cars. Some restored beautifully like this one here, and others that are in need of repair. With Cuban-US relations continuing to thaw, it's probably only a matter of time before more and more of these classics disappear from the roads. While that's not entirely a bad thing (the gas mileage on 1950s-era cars isn't exactly great), it's also a big part of the charm of Havana. Not so much that you're going back in time, but that you really are being transported to a city that's quite special. Where music and the arts flourish, but so too, does poverty. When I remember walking through Havana, I remember being constantly amazed and impressed by the sheer number of classic cars pouring through intersections and how I felt it was a city with a real energy of its own.

Read More →
Donkey 18
Donkey 18

The things you see walking the streets of old Trinidad. This man and his donkey, with the number 18 seared into its hind. Given the difficulty and cost of importing cars and gasoline, horses and donkeys help fill the gap both in terms of transportation and as general beasts of burden to assist in work. I like the quiet nature of this man behind his donkey. Maybe he'll go somewhere soon, or maybe he'll sit there for another hour, relaxing. I don't know, but in my momentary encounter, he looks like he probably has a lot of stress than most people stateside.

Read More →
American Classics In Cuba
American Classics In Cuba

If you're a fan of classic American cars, head to Cuba. Seriously. You'll see more classics than you could ever imagine. Even if you're not a fan, head to Cuba and you'll be impressed by these old clunkers that have been beautifully restored. While they are far from the most fuel-efficient vehicles, it's really quite amazing to be in a place immersed with these cars driving around. Really feels like you were transported back in time. Mostly they're used as tourist taxis, and you can find a slew of them parked outside some popular tourist hotels in the heart of Old Havana. One of the most enjoyable things I did in Cuba was to take a 2hr tour of Havana in one of these classic cars. It might have been 80 or 90 out, with super high humidity, but cruising around town in one of these convertibles with the cooling wind was well worth it.

Read More →
The Cuban PC
The Cuban PC

I always thought PC meant Personal Computer, but perhaps in Cuba, it means Portable Computer. Like a laptop! Well, it's sort of sitting on his lap, so I guess it's a laptop? Sometimes you see things, things that are so unexpected that you can only gawk. Well, if you have a camera, it's more like gawk and take a photo. Something that is totally normal in one society can be totally bizarre in another. I have no idea if this is a common thing in Cuba or not - although my hope is that this is not normal - but it sure intrigues me.

Read More →
Walking Through Trinidad
Walking Through Trinidad

Walking the streets anywhere in Cuba nets you generous opportunities to see people go about their daily lives. I don't quite know how employment and unemployment work in a socialist economy, since, I would imagine everyone has a job, but there are an awful lot of people hanging around everywhere you go with what would appear to be an abundance of time. When I saw this thin, elderly man slowly approaching I attempted to literally 'shoot from the hip' as it's not a photography style I've attempted much. Good thing he has a cane, since those cobblestone streets are not the greatest to walk on for anyone with mobility issues.

Read More →