Cuba - Lonely Planet [170]
Villa Dora González Fuentes ( 79-38-72; Pelayo Cuervo No 5; r CUC$15; ) This is enthusiastically recommended by readers. It has two rooms with bath and great food.
Getting There & Away
There’s a handy Servi-Cupet gas station at San Cayetano. The road to Santa Lucía and Cayo Jutías deteriorates to dirt outside of San Cayetano: expect a throbbing backside if you’re on a bike or moped.
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CAYO LEVISA
More frequented than Cayo Jutías but just as beautiful, Cayo Levisa sports a beach bungalow–style hotel, basic restaurant and a fully equipped diving center, yet it still manages to feel relatively isolated. Separation from the mainland obviously helps. Unlike other Cuban keys, there’s no causeway here and visitors must make the 35-minute journey by boat from Palma Rubia. Most of them agree the trip is worth it. Three kilometers of sugar-white sand and sapphire waters earmark Cayo Levisa as Pinar del Río’s best beach. American writer Ernest Hemingway first ‘discovered’ the area, part of the Archipiélago de los Colorados, in the early 1940s after he set up a fishing camp on Cayo Paraíso, a smaller coral island 10km to the east. These days Levisa attracts up to 100 visitors daily as well as the 50-plus hotel guests and, while you won’t feel like an errant Robinson Crusoe here, you should find time (and space) for plenty of R & R.
Sights & Activities
Larger and busier than Cayo Jutías, Levisa has a small marina offering scuba diving for CUC$35 per immersion, including gear and transport to the dive site. Snorkeling plus gear costs CUC$12 and a sunset cruise goes for the same price.
Sleeping & Eating
Hotel Cayo Levisa (Cubanacán; 52-35-54; s/d CUC$46/
67; ) With an idyllic tropical beach just outside your front door, you won’t really worry about the slightly outdated cabañas (cabins) and dull food choices here. Expanded to a 40-room capacity in 2006, the Levisa’s newer wooden cabins (all with bath) are an improvement on the old concrete blocks and the service has pulled its socks up too. Book ahead as this place is understandably popular.
Getting There & Away
The landing for Cayo Levisa is around 21km northeast of La Palma or 40km west of Bahía Honda. Take the turn-off to Mirian and proceed 4km through a large banana plantation to reach the coast-guard station at Palma Rubia, from which the boat to the island departs. The Cayo Levisa boat leaves at 10am and returns at 5pm, and costs CUC$25 per person round-trip (CUC$10 one-way) including lunch. From the Cayo Levisa dock you cross the mangroves on a wooden walkway to the resort and gorgeous beach along the island’s north side. If you are without a car, the easiest way to get here is via a day excursion from Viñales, good value at CUC$29 including the boat.
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BAHÍA HONDA & AROUND
The wild, whirling road to Havana through northern Pinar del Río province is surprisingly low-key and bucolic. You’ll feel as if you’re 1000 miles from the busy capital here. Sugarcane gives way to rice paddies in the shaded river valleys as you breeze past a picturesque succession of thatched farmhouses, craning royal palms and machete-wielding guajiros. It makes a tough but highly rewarding cycling route.
Bahía Honda itself is a small bustling town with a pretty church. Close by the purple shadow of the Pan de Guajaibón (699m) marks the highest point for miles around. Despite your relative proximity to Havana you’ll feel strangely isolated here, particularly as the road deteriorates after the Palma Rubia turn-off.
Your nearest accommodation options are Cayo Levisa to the west and Soroa to the southeast.
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SAN DIEGO DE LOS BAÑOS & AROUND
San Diego de los Baños, 130km southwest of Havana, is a small nondescript town just north of the Carretera Central popularly considered to be Cuba’s best spa. In common with other Cuban spas, its medicinal waters were supposedly ‘discovered’ in the early colonial period