Cuba - Lonely Planet [9]
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BIRD-WATCHING CUBA
With your binoculars polished, sally forth into the verdant Valle de Viñales where, with a bit of patience and the help of the locals, you can catch glimpses of Cuban bullfinches or chirpy Cuban peewees. The Península de Guanahacabibes has virgin beaches and dense flora that attracts everything from tody flycatchers to migratory ruby-throated hummingbirds. Don’t overlook the Sierra del Rosario Reserve, where it’s possible to spot up to 50% of Cuba’s endemic birds, including the often elusive carpinteros. The Gran Parque Natural Montemar is a huge protected area encompassing Cuba’s largest wetland. Wait around for a few hours (or days) and you might see a zunzún – the world’s smallest bird. In Topes de Collantes keep an eye out for the bright red, white and blue tocororo (Cuba’s national bird), then venture into Cayo Romano to get a look at some of the island’s more than 30,000 flamingos. La Hacienda la Belén Reserve near Camagüey promises glimpses of Cuban parakeets, giant kingbirds and Antillean palm swifts. While the journey might appear long and the hiking arduous, no Cuban birding adventure is complete without a visit to the almost virgin Parque Nacional Alejandro de Humboldt for viewings of Cuban Amazon parrots, hook-billed kites and – unlikely but not impossible – ivory-billed woodpeckers last spotted here in the early 1980s.
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ISLANDS IN THE ARCHIPELAGO
Hotel-free Cayo Jutías is the highlight of the Archipelago de los Colorados, the necklace of quiet keys that stretches west from Havana. If you need a room for the night, catch the boat to Cayo Levisa, its more developed but equally beautiful eastern sibling. Leapfrogging Havana, you’ll have to go upmarket on Cayo Ensenachos, where a plush new resort has embellished (and privatized) one of Cuba’s most stunning beaches. Three keys on the huge Sabana-Camagüey archipelago are linked to the mainland by a massive causeway. Cayo Guillermo plays heavily on its Hemingway connections; Cayo Coco, Cuba’s fourth-largest island, is replete with large resorts; while uninhabited Cayo Paredón Grande guards a solitary lighthouse, a couple of fine beaches and plenty of fishing possibilities. Heading east on another causeway to Cayo Romano, the tourists are replaced by flamingos, mosquitoes and plenty of interesting birdlife. Cayo Sabinal with its lighthouse and old Spanish fort is a favorite of many, while tiny Cayo Saetía has a safari park with exotic African fauna. For real Robinson Crusoe–like isolation you’ll need to charter a trip to the Jardines de la Reina, a chain of 600 uninhabited keys where the only accommodation is on a floating hotel. It’s not particularly Cuban, but tourists love Cayo Largo del Sur for its visiting turtles and Cuba’s only nudist beach.
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PARKS & RESERVES
On the island’s western tip, the Parque Nacional Península de Guanahacabibes is home to crabs, turtles, archaeological sites and not many humans. Further east but also in Pinar del Río province, the karstic, cave-flecked Parque Nacional Viñales is a Unesco World Heritage Site that exhibits the fine art of Cuban tobacco-growing. Pinar’s third Unesco site is the Sierra del Rosario Reserve, an oft-lauded biosphere and site of the country’s most successful environmental reclamation project. Cuba’s biggest protected area, the expansive Grand Parque Natural