Dans Going Global

Geaux Saints

In Miami airport and just was walking past a girl with her auburn sweatshirt. I gave her a Roll Tide!!
She wasn’t happy 😃

Told her sorry but I had to do it

Back in the states!!!
Just landed in Miami. Next flight to houston in a few hours.
I have been really good about eating, so what do I do when I get back here?
Nathan’s and this stupid meal cost $20!!!
Also needed a Diet Coke, there are no diet sodas in Cuba . I hope this processed food doesn’t kill my stomach
Will be in houston for a bit and then the drive back to Tuscaloosa ( detours in lake Charles, New Orleans and Biloxi on the way back)
On my last day in Cuba I paid to use one of the hotels roof top pools and relaxed

My body is officially broken.
Just overall sore and blah😞
I think my shoulder is still messed up, I’m afraid the tears didn’t heal, or one of the tears. Will be seeing the doctor when I get back home.
Almost no exercise yesterday but took the bus to Playa Santa Maria. An hour or so outside Havana. Was really nice , and got a little heatstroke. Rough night last night.
I did get in about a slow 10 mile walk today. I think I may go the one of the hotels and pay to use the pool tomorrow. Tomorrow, Friday, is my last day in Cuba.
My flight is at 11:45am Saturday!
I did get some ice cream today, have to say it was really really good. And my landlord made dinner.
Arroz con Gris and a little chicken
Back to resting!!

Habana Cuba
Only a little walking and a lot of cooking

Tostones rellenos with pork and cheese

Frijoles Colorado y arroz blanco

Masa de cerdo

Also it was international Boxing Day in Cuba

Habana Cuba
Finally got in a lot of exploring
Walked “el malecon” from habana Vieja, habana central, pedado to Miramar and back . This is basically the street next to the water . Went past the US embassy, also a large monument for the USS Maine. Make sure you enlarge the pictures and try to read the inscriptions.
Then had some lobster for dinner. $7 for lobster, rice and a drink.
Will be doing more cooking either tonight or tomorrow night

Habana Cuba
Some more exploring and cooking
Vaca frita
Tostones
Yucca frita
Arroz con Gris

Hard to get a WiFi signal strong enough to post
HABANA CUBA
lots of cooking and going to get ingredients. Not easy here , takes a lot of walking to different outdoor or open air vendors to find certain ingredients. Especially hard to find meat or pork.
So far have made Cuban tamales
Frijoles negros, Ropa Vieja, yucca and cerdo asado.
Tomorrowarroz com Gris , tostones , yucca grits and not sure what meat yet.
Also explored the port area of Havana which was impressive

Varadero Cuba
Big beach day today
Beautiful crystal clear water , can see 20 feet deep. Unfortunately, and this is my one rant like Cuban people don’t care about throwing trash and beer, cans and bottles not only on the beach but in the water. And there are trash cans every 25 to 35 yards really really frustrating and bothersome.
Great festival going on here in town with live music all week. Tonight was fantastic tons of food and beer/liquor vendors and instead of being expensive. It was actually cheaper than anything in town. Good job Cuba!

First few hours in veradero cuba. 🇨🇺
Now waiting for the storm to hopefully move on
Had to add a picture of the Russian cars here (Lada), no idea what year but a lot of same model here ( the ugly red one)

Cienfuegos Cuba
Very nice city, overall much cleaner than the other larger cities.
Had some good food and drinks, walked a good bit of the Calle malecon,
Also took a trip to “el nicho waterfalls”
Beautiful, went swimming in the cold mountain water and a little hiking.
Tomorrow I go to Veradero!

Santa Clara Cuba
This is the statue of Che Guevara holding a child.
Spent about a half hour really looking at the details. I tried to show you pictures from wider angle to close ups of the details.

Santa Clara Cuba
Got back to me 10 miles per day today, but definitely feeling it. Don’t know if it’s the heat and humidity, or the 10,000 mosquito bills and sickness coming on?
Had a great meal
Ropa Vieja, rice with beans, tostines, a beef and a bottle water $8

Trinidad Cuba
So I went to this club, la cueva, that’s inside a cave.
Very warm inside as there is no air conditioning, but very very cool place

Trinidad Cuba
Horseback riding trip again.
Great ride, trotted almost the full time.
Luckily horse had a fairly smooth gait.
Total time exploring was about 5 hours for $10!!!
Thought I was fall and kill mystery at the waterfall, went swimming in the mountain water.
Also stopped and had some freshly roasted coffee bean coffee

A few pictures from Trinidad Cuba.
These streets are really hard to walk, can’t believe they drive (very slow) on them. Not semi level like Europe, and unfortunately they don’t get fixed. Really hurt my foot yesterday, not going to be able to keep up my walking regiment 😞
Nice smaller town, dealing with rolling blackouts daily, met some really nice people!
Drinking too much beer!!!
Went to Trinidad peninsula beach today and had another mixed seafood dinner and watched a salsa teaching class 😁
Going to hit 2 clubs tonight including one that is inside a cave ( if I make it)
Tomorrow if I wake up will be another horseback ride and mountain swim

Vinales, Cuba
Extremely beautiful valley where almost all the to***co is grown. Also sugar cane, yucca, rice, avocados, plantains, coffee and more. Went on a 5 hour horseback riding tour through the valley, stopped for a break and lunch at a farmers camposino.
Very small town and unfortunately many rolling black outs ( last one over 6 hours)
Tomorrow I go to Trinidad Cuba ( 6-7 hour bus ride)

Vinales, Cuba
Extremely beautiful valley where almost all the to***co is grown. Also sugar cane, yucca, rice, avocados, plantains, coffee and more. Went on a 5 hour horseback riding tour through the valley, stopped for a break and lunch at a farmers camposino.
Very small town and unfortunately many rolling black outs ( last one over 6 hours)
Tomorrow I go to Trinidad Cuba ( 6-7 hour bus ride)

These photos don’t even come close to showing how amazing the valley is, this is where they should have shot those dinosaur movies (I’m completely blanking out on the name right now)

On the way , 3 hour taxi ride, to valley of vinales. And a few pics from vinales

Habana Vieja
Had a great stay with William, his wife Carmen and her sister Marisol ( I hope I got that right). Stayed very close to the capital, there is a lot of history in the city.
They made me dinner, some great fried yucca and fried plantains ( yucca frita y tostones) and fantastic Ropa Vieja and rice.
I am taking a shared taxi to Vinales tomorrow, where a lot of to***co is grown.
I will be visiting probably 4-5 other cities and , so far, back to Havana Vieja , where I will be spending a week cooking with Marisol

Pedado and old Havana
I walked all over the place. My phone does not work here. It will only work if I’m staying at a place that has Wi-Fi and then only works. Sometimes I end up walking to old Havana without knowing where I was going and probably ended up walking an extra and a half or 2 miles until , I asked somebody and I turned around and walked back in a different direction, I had walked way too far. Today and tonight I will be doing more exploring of old Havana, and then tomorrow I go to a town called Vinales where they grow a lot of to***co and I will be going horseback riding. I am being told it is a very small town and a lot of nature, which is what I want. Still asking around about learning t to make the different Cuban dishes I think I will be returning to havana for that in another week or so. It is very difficult to get from one city to the other so I’m not sure how many different cities I will be able to visit but I will try to keep you posted.

First night in Cuba, don’t like where I’m staying, not good. But only booked for two nights , so hopefully moving to old Havana . Will check it out tomorrow. so when I was getting my connecting flight in Boston, talk to the agent there goes to Cuba every few weeks recommended this restaurant, which was only a few blocks from where I’m staying a little on the expensive side for Cuba, but it was really good. I had the mixed grilled, black beans and rice. I have to say the black beans really stood out. Probably some the best I’ve had. I couldn’t find a place so I asked some lady on the street who obviously then she did to come to the restaurant with me bought a drink and then obligated to give her some money to “buy milk for her baby. “ Anyway, got some good live music also

Part 2 of my travels starts today
I am in Tampa flying to Cuba
Spent the night in the Tampa airport, just had to use a bunch more of my miles to secure early flight, bought visa and now hopefully I filled out everything correctly and when I get to Havana I don’t have any problems

This trip is all about learning the food and recipes, if I can’t find restaurants or families that will teach me , then this will be a costly nightmare trip. Send my thoughts and prayers for the best!!!
If all goes well will be here 4 weeks plus, if not will be home in 2 weeks max
You all may not hear from me much as internet and WiFi is going to be very limited , maybe restricted
Wish me luck

Well that’s a wrap for Europe
Flew out of Lisbon today
I have to say the metro (subway) stations in Lisbon are MUCH nicer than the US.
Hard to believe I’m back in the USA
In Boston waiting on connecting flight to Tampa
Tomorrow starts exploits part 2

One last thing from Evora
Walking back to the train station I saw some horses and saw the stables and asked if I could go inside. Found out it is the national guard /police in Portugal.
They let me in and one of the officers spoke good English and told me they mainly do beach patrols and special events, total of up to 22 horses
Very cool they do patrols

Evora Portugal
Smaller city , basically took it easy
Tomorrow last stop Lisbon

Elvas Portugal
Smaller city with a lot a lot a lot to see. I still haven’t gotten through all of it, but I will be leaving tomorrow morning really nice relaxing city, all the sidewalks are actually done with mosaic stone. The whole city is surrounded by fortress walls, and the hotel I’m staying at actually is right by the walls did a lot of walking as usual, lots of hills but not terrible terrible. I had a really good dinner, actually sat down for dinner for 1 a few times, forgot to tell you all that unfortunately the railroad station is an hour walk away and when I got here a couple days ago, it’s 100% , uphill , like major uphill , and my backpack is 35 to 40 pounds, I almost died 😁. I have to make that same walk tomorrow but this time it’s downhill so I should be OK.
Also, at the fortress, I ended up walking around the whole thing since it wasn’t open and somehow made my way in between the first set of walls and the second set of walls, upon leaving, I had to unlock one of the doors to the gates from the inside, I hope tomorrow when they open whoever thought they locked it doesn’t get in trouble , I tried to get inside the whole fortress but couldn’t do. It are showing you a couple pictures of the hotel I stayed at. Haven’t decided on where I’m going to tomorrow yet. I’ll decide that in the morning. I’ll keep you posted.

Elvas Portugal

Not a lot of sightseeing today I’m actually going to spend two nights here and take it a little bit easy. Great hotel tomorrow I’m gonna post some pictures, it’s very interesting part of it open part of it. It’s right on the fortified walls of the city. It’s got a nice small area to chill out in a small pool. I was able to get them to upgrade me to a double room with a balcony and the balcony is huge. You can see my view from the balcony in the pictures, but some local white wine and just gonna relax tonight tomorrow I will see all the sites. It’s really nice being pretty much the only American the last few days, only problem is I don’t speak. Portuguese and Spanish is not very good here in town. Most people don’t speak English. I have to say I see where some people go to Portugal or Italy or whatever and they’re going for two or three weeks, I highly recommend getting out of the big cities. Most of the small towns are only an hour or a two hour train ride outside the city you could always make it a day trip . It’s so much better to be in an environment. That is actually the day-to-day life of the people that live here. Also, it’s not wall-to-wall tourists, and honestly, it’s much more relaxing. Even when you are in the big cities, try to walk outside of the main tourist areas and visit some local local restaurants , cafés bars, coffee, shops, and little markets. I guarantee you you’ll enjoy it and you’re gonna save yourself a ton of money, especially on things like water, soda, and beer. So I did my last load of laundry in Europe, found a small little place and had some amazing charcoal broiled chicken. The flavor was fantastic and the chicken and fries cost me I believe about €6.50.
While I was doing my laundry, also stopped and had a small beer. Also the train ride over here was just one car! And only comes to town and leaves town twice a day. Just a day in the life.😁😁