Day 7: Guaracabulla-Matagua

Guaracabulla-Matagua

 

There is very little light in the casa cultural of Guaracabulla. The only light bulb worthy of the name shines in the main room, near the front door. The bathroom, next to the room with the mattress, is dark as a cave. The black mass of a large tank filled with water rose between the sink and a flat floor with a drain near the wall; what passes for a shower in Cuba. I “showered” throwing water from the tank on myself with a small cup. The splashing surprising the skin without forewarning from the eyes. Peeing in the toilet during the night was a challenge, not that a few drops outside the bowl would be noticeable. Flushing meant pulling water out of the tank into the toilette with a larger bucket. Nevertheless, it was, as they say, all good. I surface from the blackness with plentiful sleep and ready to roll at six. 

The promotora had brought me a thermos full of coffee the night before. Drinking coffee like this now – as I awake with the morning, in a small town in the center of Cuba, prepared specially to send me on my way through the Cuban countryside – makes it taste like ambrosia. I pull my pack to the front porch, breathing in the cool morning air. 

Day 6 Part 2: Placetas to Guaracabulla

Walking to Guaracabulla; the Geographic Center of Cuba

The date associated with the Triunfo de la Revolución, the Triumph of the Revolution, is January 1, 1959. Many people imagine the bearded rebels marching into Havana on New Year’s Day, welcomed by the jubilant throngs. The date and the triumph, however, have more to do with events that took place along these cane fields and guardarayas on New Year’s Eve, 1958. Che Guevara and his troops overwhelmed the forces of Batista in Santa Clara, the city about thirty kilometers to the west of Placetas. Che took Placetas on December 22, 1958 and Remedios on Christmas Day, 1958. He regrouped in Placetas and asked his cartographer to find a route to Santa Clara “por dentero,” not on the main roads leading to the city. It is certain that his route crossed the path that we blazed today. His troops moved in the direction of Sabana, a small town north west of Placetas.  If he took no main road to get to Sabana, his guerrilleros could not avoid tramping along the same cane fields, crossing the same railroad lines and seeing the same palm trees that my two friends and I encountered today. It is easy to imagine their rifled trudging through these back roads, cheered on by the parents of our direction givers today. The old lady who served us good lemonade and bad information was a child then. Maybe she watched open mouthed as Che went by, hopeful or fearful of what lay ahead. 

***

The van takes us to the center of Placetas.  The Casa de Cultura stands across from the shady park that offered a particularly inviting welcome to the town. It seems like an enjoyable place to lay in the shade and spend some time after a long day walking.   This would be a good layover for walkers tired of small towns.  Placetas is not a metropole but with 72,000 people, it can sustain a more diverse social life than the small towns so far encountered on the route. With several private and state-run restaurants, a hotel or two, and neighborhoods to explore, it makes for a good lay-over town. 

Day 6: Zulueta to Guaracabulla: The Geographic Center of Cuba--Part1 Placetas

Zulueta-Placetas: On our Way to Guaracabulla, the Geographic Center of Cuba

 

The morning rushed up on us during sleep about the same time it always does. Too damn early. 

“The muchachos are not here yet?” the promatora asks, referring to Maykel and Carlos Alejandro. My two friends had agreed to meet us in Zulueta and guide us into Guaracabulla, the geographic center of Cuba and Carlos Alejandro’s hometown. We stand on the road heading out of the Casa de Protocolo. She just rolled up in her Lada to say goodbye and to give Joel, Alexis and the kids a ride back to Remedios.

“They are on their way, pidiendo botella, hitchhiking, from town,” I say. 

“Ah,” she says. “That must have been them that we passed. The one with a hat and the other one with the baseball cap.” 

“Yeah. Maykel always wears a straw fedora hat,” I nod. 

She gives the driver instructions to go pick them up.

I say goodbye to Alexis and the crew. I give them all something to remember me: the twins smile wide when I handed them each a pair of biking gloves that I had packed in case I needed help gripping my hiking poles. Alexis and Joel object to receiving 50 CUC each but then shift to thanking me when it becomes obvious that I am not going to take it back. 

"We’re leaving you in good hands, it seems,” says Alexis.

“Se te quiere, Alexis.” I say. Gracias por todo.” They head back to a life of little resources and much work. This walk had been a vacation for them.

Viñas-Zulueta: Part 2-The Birthplace of Cuban Soccer

 Zulueta: The Birthplace of Cuban Soccer

At Adela, the Remedios promotora and Robert, the film maker who we met after the caves, wait for us.  

“The lunch is almost ready,” says the promotora, waving us towards a gazebo standing at the edge of a grassy area. “Find some shade and I’ll come get you.”  

Craning our necks we look looking straight up at the smokestack of the mill, visible for miles and serving as a compass point as we walked the last few kilometers.  What looks like the old Casa Mayoral stands across the grass from the gazebo. 

Sitting under the gazebo offers some shade but the angle of the sun ignored the roof. 

“Damn, it’s hot,” says Joel. 

“It’s 11 o’clock,” I say. “We’re still in the first act.”

After lunch, Robert the cameraman walks with us to Zulueta.  He wants to interview me on the way and get some footage of the trail.   

Two kilometers of dust lead us to a busy crossroad where trucks pick up passengers and vendors sell fruits, garlic and whatever else they have to sell. We cross the asphalt into the expansive cane fields that stretch to the hills along the southern horizon.  This is sugar cane country.  Fields stretched as far as the eye can see in all directions.  We enter a labyrinth of guardarayas through the canyons of cane and wind through them, keeping the hills to the south.  

Day 5: Viñas to Zulueta: Part 1-We find an aboriginal tool!

We Find an Aboriginal Tool!!

I stayed at the Ariosa for a long time. When I arrived there, the workers asked me, “Hey, where you come from?” And I told them, “I’m a freedman from Purio.” Then they took me to the overseer. He gave me work. He put me to cutting cane. It didn’t seem strange to me; I was already an expert at that. I also cleared the field. That sugar mill was average size.  The owner was Ariosa by name, a pure-blood Spaniard. The ariosa was one of the first to be converted to a central site because it had a wide belt that carried the cane to the boiler room. Inside there, it was like all other sugar mills. There were brownnoses and ass kissers for the overseers and masters. (61-62)

--Esteban Montejo

 

At six we leave the camp, hit the sidewalk of the main street, and walk back to the park to join the dirt path to Adela. The most direct route would have been to continue following the old railroad line to Chiquitico, the old Ariosa ingenio where Esteban worked, but a lunch had been arranged at Adela and that’s where we’re going. 

We cross barbed wire fences, walk on grassland, and enter a series of cattle ranches where fences, angry cows, and a relentless mixture of mud and cow shit require us to focus on each step. The cows with calves by their sides eye us suspiciously. We work our way under the fences and around barbed wire gates. Two real cowboys cross our path, riding tall and straight in the saddle, sporting cowboy hats made of straw.