Cuba - Lonely Planet [312]
Sleeping & Eating
Villa El Yarey (Cubanacán; 42-76-84; s/d CUC$31/46) Back toward Jiguaní, 23km southwest of Dos Ríos, is this relaxed, attractive hotel with 16 rooms on a ridge with an excellent view of the Sierra Maestra. This accommodation is perfect for those who want tranquility in verdant natural surroundings. Cubanacán organizes bird-watching trips here. Book through its office in Bayamo Click here.
To get to Villa El Yarey from Jiguaní, go 4km east of town on the Carretera Central and then 6km north on a side road. From Dos Ríos proceed southwest on the road toward Jiguaní and turn left 2km the other side of Las Palmas. It makes an ideal stop for anyone caught between Bayamo and Santiago de Cuba, or for those taking the backdoor Bayamo–Holguín route. Note that public transport here is scant.
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YARA
pop 29,237
A small town with a big history, Yara – sandwiched halfway between Bayamo and Manzanillo amid vast fields of sugarcane –
is barely mentioned in most travel literature. While ostensibly agricultural, the town’s soul is defiantly Indian. The early Spanish colonizers earmarked it as one of their pueblos Indios (Indian towns) and a statue of rebel cacique (chief) Hatuey in the main square supports claims that the Spanish burned the dissenting Taíno chief here rather than in Baracoa. Chapter two of Yara’s history began on October 11, 1868, when it became the first town to be wrested from Spanish control by rebel forces led by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes. A second monument in the main square recalls this important event and the famous Grito de Yara (Yara Declaration) that followed, in which Céspedes proclaimed Cuba’s independence for the first time.
Just off the square, the Museo Municipal (Grito de Yara No 107; admission CUC$1; 8am-noon & 2-6pm Mon-Sat, 9am-noon Sun) chronicles Yara’s historical legacy along with the town’s role as a key supply center during the revolutionary war in the 1950s.
There’s a Servi-Cupet here if you need a gas top-up. The Bayamo–Manzanillo train stops here three times a day.
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GRAN PARQUE NACIONAL SIERRA MAESTRA
Comprising a sublime mountainscape of broccoli-green peaks and humid cloud forest, and home to honest, hardworking campesinos (country folk), the Gran Parque Nacional Sierra Maestra is an alluring natural sanctuary that still echoes with the gunshots of Castro’s guerrilla campaign of the late 1950s. Situated 40km south of Yara, up a very steep 24km concrete road from Bartolomé Masó, this precipitous and untamed region contains the country’s highest peak, Pico Turquino (just over the border in Santiago de Cuba province), unlimited birdlife and flora, and the rebels’ one-time wartime headquarters, Comandancia La Plata.
History
History resonates throughout these mountains, the bulk of it linked indelibly to the guerrilla war that raged throughout this region between December 1956 and December 1958. For the first year of the conflict Fidel and his growing band of supporters remained on the move, never staying in one place for more than a few days. It was only in mid-1958 that the rebels established a permanent base on a ridge in the shadow of Pico Turquino. This headquarters became known as La Plata and it was from here that the combative Castro drafted many of the early revolutionary laws while he orchestrated the military strikes that finally brought about the ultimate demise of the Batista government.
Information
Aspiring visitors should check the current situation before arriving in the national park. Tropical storms and/or government bureaucracy have been known to put the place temporarily out of action. The best source of information is Cubamar ( 7-833-2523/4) in Havana, or you can go straight to the horse’s mouth by directly contacting Villa Santo Domingo ( 56-53-02). These guys can put you in touch with the Centro de Información de Flora y Fauna next door (Click here). Additional information can be gleaned at the Cubanacán desk at the Hotel Royalton in Bayamo (Click