I agree with Brewerdave - March is one of the best times of year weatherwise - hot and sunny but nowhere near as humid as the summer months but late May is very early in the hurricane season and whilst there is chance of getting rain the tropical storms are going to relatively underdeveloped at that time of year. On the whole they will be starting to form out at sea but it will a while before they start to make landfall in most seasons.

However, Justval, be reassured that regardless of when you go it's extremely rare to experience prolonged rainfall as we are used to (have been experiencing recently here!). On the whole when it rains in Cuba it does so in relatively short, though very heavy rainstorms, and it can sometimes be a relief because the air becomes much less humid and much more pleasant as a result. Most of my visits to Cuba have been slap bang in the middle of the hurricane season in July/August and you soon learn to plan your day around those late afternoon cloudbursts - it's no coincidence that the locals disappear from the streets for a siesta around 3pm!

If you are out and about in Havana in the areas that contain the sights that tourists are interested in then you'll only ever be a short dash from a bar, so if it starts to rain (and you'll be warned by the sky turning very dark that it is on its way) then take it as an excuse to go and sit down in a bar, have a mojito and listen to the live band that will invariably be playing. Once the rain stops (usually within the hour or even less) the sun comes out again, the steam starts rising from the streets and the whole cycle begins again with the humidity building up to another shower around the same time the next day! Within a very short time of it stopping there'll be little evidence of it ever having rained. Immediately after a heavy rain shower is often the best time of day for wandering the streets - the rain cools the air down, it feels cleaner and lighter and the sun shines free of the previously overcast sky.

In the more rundown areas there can sometimes be lingering effects in terms of shortlived street flooding as the drains struggle to cope with really heavy cloudbursts but this will be less of a problem in late May compared to later in the year and it is unlikely to affect the areas you will be wanting to get out and about in. The centre of Havana, and especially the Vieja district is now much renovated and improved - the streets are much less potholed and the drains a lot less likely to be blocked. The days of navigating back to the casa I was staying in on my first visit by remembering to turn towards the Malecon at the junction with the permanent 'pond' in the middle are over - much to the relief of the locals as well I'm sure

Go an enjoy yourself - Cuba is an amazingly varied island and Havana Vieja really does deserve its World Heritage status.

SM

Thanks for your detailed reply...it is not just the touristy bit I am interested in. I love to explore places where the locals go to get a picture of real life off the beaten track so to speak. I love history, I love culture, architecture..all of it ( I also love bars and music and dancing) so i am very much lookiog forward to doing this..i am not sure 3 days would be enough in Havana..but it will do for starters. I am not good at drop and flop, just cant do it..so it is a good job the hotel we have picked in Varadero has its own dive school and plenty of other watersport activities to do..as well as miles and miles of glorious beach to walk on and photograph

I am sooooo excited already and I aint even booked it. A definite goer in my eyes.

it is not just the touristy bit I am interested in. I love to explore places where the locals go to get a picture of real life off the beaten track so to speak.

Hi Justval, I perhaps should have been a bit more specific - what I meant was that I was assuming that you wouldn't be spending much time out and about in the outlying 'barrios' away from the historic centre of the city. The infrastructure can be very bad out there and, well, lets just say that you wouldn't want to be wearing sandals during/after a very heavy rainfall in many suburban neighbourhoods. Or to use any of the toilets. I've been to meet with local neighbourhood carnevale troops in outer barrios where the tower blocks of flats are all surrounded by high fences with covered walkways to the entrance to the block - the fence marks the perimeter of the area that masonry falling off the building is likely to land in and is there for people's safety. Blocks that here you would assume from their appearance are being prepared for demolition, are still people's homes and there is no money to replace these mainly 1960s Soviet built housing blocks. It's why everybody dreams of owning an older colonial era house in the centre of all the cities because they are more solidly built and more easily repairable by the occupant themselves.

I don't want to be alarmist - Havana is a very safe city - but equally I think that you do need to be sensible and not do things there that you would sensibly avoid at home. Would any of us encourage tourists to the UK to venture into poor housing estates where they will stick out like a sore thumb with lots of things worth stealing on them? Probably not and the same goes for Cuba. But that doesn't mean that you have to stick to the tourist enclaves - not at all. And there are lots of places that you can go and spend time and be with the locals - and others that you might want to give a miss because they will be heavily dominated by visitors and the only locals present are likely to be Jinteros/as.

For example, your tour rep will probably really push an excursion to the open air Tropicana night club where there is an amazing floor show but it will be filled with tourists eating an expensive mediocre fried chicken dinner. Not my cup of tea and from the sound of it not yours either so give it a miss. Similarly the Casa da Musica in the Centro district is a very flash modern nightclub (though with afternoon matinees that start around 4ish!) and it's where all the top bands play but the prices are such that most locals can't afford to get in unless paid for by a tourist. I've never danced with a local there!

Whereas the Casa de la Musica out in Mirimar has a two tier pricing policy that annoys some tourists because they will pay a lot more than the locals are charged but means that you can and do meet local people on a more equal footing and the ambience of the old colonial villa that houses it is much nicer and the top bands also play here to but to a much more local audience. If you are staying in Vieja or Centro it's a 15CUC taxi ride away which means that a night out here will cost a couple the same as one at the Casa de la Musica in Centro but it will be a completely different experience. Just remember to ask the taxi driver to come and pick you up later - because few tourists go out to it, you can't rely on taxis being around when you want to go home. Negotiate the return fare in advance and there's a good chance that he'll consider it worth his while to simply wait outside until you are ready to go home. Offer to pay for him to go in with you and he'll be your friend for life and won't mind if you don't make tracks until 3 in the morning!

But I think that I'm on a safe bet that if you go to the Casa de la Cultura in Viejo you'll be the only tourists there. For around 3 national pesos (not even CUCs and so literally coppers to us) you won't get to hear a big name band that you might have heard of but you will get to listen and dance to what the locals are all into at the time. You will be perfectly safe as long as you don't have any ice in your drinks (it will have just been hagged off a huge lump sitting on the floor!) and don't use the loos unless you are really, really desperate and/or have a very strong stomach Don't expect people to be able to converse with you in English but if you want to go to where the locals go and listen to the most popular local bands and learn the latest 'reggaeton' dance moves it probably can't be bettered. The nightly programmes cover the whole spectrum of Cuban music so it can be bit of a lucky dip - it could be a classical quartet playing or the latest hip-hop wannabes but it will be nothing like how most tourists get to spend their evenings in Havana. And I've walked home on my own from there in the early hours without ever encountering a spot of bother.

Which is another thing to bear in mind - the Cubans keep very late hours. Life in the heat and the humidity of the summer revolves getting up very early for work, heading home to eat and have a siesta at the end of the working day in the late afternoon/early evening, surfacing after the sun has gone down and heading out after 9pm or later to meet friends and socialise and then off home in the early hours for a few hours sleep before work. Living 'la vida loca' in Cuba means learning to sleep in 2 shifts in every 24 hrs. So a venue that is jam-packed with tourists until their tour bus leaves to take them back to their hotel at 11ish can have completely changed character by midnight and the locals are ready to party!

If and when you do go there are lots of other suggestions I can make nearer the time - just ask away. You're right - 3 days is not enough to see and do everything that Havana has to offer but that's just the perfect excuse to go back

SM

PS If you are wanting to do some reading up I recommend the Rough Guide - I know that Lonely Planet has its fans but I think that the Rough Guide is usually more up to date with it's info and is less worried about warning about potential rip-offs or directing you to the cheapest options all the time. Clause No 1 in the job description for 'Tourist in Cuba' is 'spend some money' as far as I'm concerned - we are extremely wealthy compared to the locals. They're not riping us off - they're just being better entrepreneurs than most of us will ever be

Wow, thank you for such detailed information.

I will be reading up quite abit before I go becuase quite simply I will want to make the most of it. I can speak some Spanish and am able to converse quite well sometimes as long as people don't speak too fast ( I usually end up asking them to slow down or repeat what they have said).

I am quite excited already and I will be booking later this morning.

I am sure I willl have loads of questions to ask

Apologies Mds - now that you've amalgamated Justval's post with the weather thread I realise just how off-topic I went

SM

and I have just booked...

We are considering either Varadero or Caya Coco in the first two weeks of September, can anyone give me any information about what we can expect weather wise?
I know it's the rainy season but do you get short torrential downpours or is it like Manchester and rains non stop.

Thanks

It can do both but on the whole expect a short heavy downfall every afternoon as the humidity builds up. Bear in mind that September is not just in the rainy season but the hurricane season so it can be accompanied by really strong winds if you are close to the path of a tropical storm/hurricane as well but it's never put me off travelling to Cuba at that time of year. Though I am looking forward to going in less than 2 weeks time and not having to put up with the humidity of July and August!

SM