Cuba - Lonely Planet [147]
The return leg is equally problematic. Procure your ticket as early as possible in Nueva Gerona’s Naviera Cubana Caribeña (NCC) ferry terminal ( 32-49-77, 32-44-15; cnr Calles 31 & 24), beside the Río Las Casas. The ferry leaves for Surgidero de Batabanó daily at 8am (CUC$50), but you’ll need to get there at least two hours beforehand to tackle the infamous queues. A second boat is supposed to leave at noon (with a check-in time of 9:30am).
Before reserving tickets, ask if there’s a bus connection from Surgidero de Batabanó to Havana. A connecting bus should cost CUC$5 and you will need to make a reservation as you buy your boat ticket.
True to form, there are no printed schedules for the ferry crossings to and from La Isla. Don’t take anything as a given until you have booked your ticket. Isla boat crossings, rather like Cuban trains, have an annoying tendency of being late, breaking down or getting cancelled altogether.
Traveling in either direction you’ll need to show your passport. See Surgidero de Batabanó Click here and Havana City for more information.
Getting Around
TO/FROM THE AIRPORT
From the airport, look for the bus marked ‘Servicio Aéreo,’ which will take you into town for one peso. To get to the airport, catch this bus in front of Cine Caribe (cnr Calles 28 & 37). A taxi to town will cost about CUC$6, or CUC$35 to the Hotel Colony.
BUS
Ecotur can organize trips/transfers from Nueva Gerona to the diving areas and into the militarized zone. A taxi from Nueva Gerona to Hotel Colony should cost approximately CUC$20. There are less reliable local buses: buses 431 to La Fe (26km) and 441 to the Hotel Colony (45km) leave from a stop opposite the cemetery on Calle 39A, just northwest of the hospital.
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OPEN UNIVERSITY
While it might lack the academic credentials of Oxford or Harvard, the Isla de la Juventud’s record as an international educator is, arguably, one of the Revolution’s greatest triumphs.
The first school on the erstwhile Isla de Pinos (Isle of Pines) opened in 1961 during the Campaña Alfabetización, a government-sponsored campaign that aimed to stamp out illiteracy and provide free and fair education for all Cubans. More schools followed and, by the 1970s, industrious construction brigades had built over 40 junior high schools and eight fully fledged high schools on the Isla, along with night schools, technical institutes and teacher-training colleges.
Castro’s long-term aim had always been to share Cuba’s successful literacy campaign with other developing countries, and in 1977 the first overseas scholarships were awarded to 2000 seventh-graders from the war-torn African state of Angola. This initial intake was quickly followed by other groups from Angola and Mozambique and, within a few years, there were close to 150,000 students on La Isla studying everything from art to zoology.
Encouraged to give back as much as they took, the overseas students were expected to learn Spanish and socialistically contribute to the annual fruit harvest in the island’s famous citrus plantations. In return, they were given free tuition and board, a monthly stipend, and – most importantly – a level and quality of education that, in their own countries, would have been little more than an impossible pipe dream.
Buoyed by its new role as the unofficial mentor of the world’s developing nations, Cuba hosted the 11th World Youth Festival in 1978 in Havana, during which a headmaster-like Fidel stood up and announced to the world that he was renaming Cuba’s giant offshore classroom, La Isla de la Juventud. No one argued.
Changes to the world order along with the economic chaos that accompanied the Special Period drove a dent in Cuba’s international education campaign, but didn’t kill it. Today