This trip report describes a one week birding trip to
eastern Cuba by Jim Rose and Dave Ferguson.
Having seen many of the European birds and some of those
of The Gambia and Goa, we decided on a change of faunal region. We were limited to one
week which cut out many of the far-flung places. First Choice Holidays operate charter
flights to Cuba which were reasonably priced, JR had not been to the Caribbean while DF
had once been to Tobago in 1978. Both of us had been to North America many times but Cuba
offered an opportunity to see many of the eastern North American warblers in their winter
quarters. Given that Cuba also has some interesting endemics we decided that this was to
be our destination. We decided to explore the eastern end of the island rather the western
end where the bird tours go.
Information
The internet was, as usual, very helpful. There are a
number of bird trip reports on Cuba though we found only one that went to the east - Blake
Maybank’s at This report determined our
first two stops.
Books
We used Field Guide to the Birds of Cuba by
Garrido and Kirkconnell. This proved to be useful - though not entirely accurate
- for distributions but has rather substandard illustrations. The bird names used in this
report are those used in this book. We also used the National Geographic Guide to
the Birds of North America. Butterfly ID was provided by The Butterflies
of the West Indies by Riley. We also had the Footprint Guide to Cuba.
Other Internet Trip Reports
We managed to glean a lot of useful information from the
large number of trip reports that are available on the internet. However, almost all
of these do not cover the eastern end of the island and the only point of overlap was at
Najasa.
We did find the following of use :-
Map
We used The Rough Guide 1:850,000 map of Cuba.
This proved to be accurate as to distances but misleading in some details such as the
relation of railway lines to roads, which can be a useful guide as to where you are. Maps
are like gold dust in Cuba. An offer was made to buy our map by one of the few tourists we
met. We declined.
To give some idea as to what can be expected in the way of
road quality the following colours on the map represented:
Brown roads: surfaced, good
Yellow roads: surfaced with infrequent potholes
White roads: surfaced with many potholes
Grey lines: usually unsurfaced with quality
varying between quite good to only just passable with 4-wheel drive
Travelling
Cuba is not geared to the independent traveller. The roads
are badly maintained and road signs are often non-existent, even at major road junctions.
Hotels, places to eat, and garages are scarce while shops are invisible. On the other
hand, the people are friendly and courteous and were very helpful in pointing us in the
right direction. A four-wheel drive vehicle is essential if you want to travel on the road
from Cruce de los Banos to the south coast, but this road (or rather, track) is probably
best avoided.
Food
Cuba is not noted for its cuisine. We had two quite good
meals during our stay - one of pork ( the pigs are free-range!) and one of fish (we were
in a fishing town) but otherwise meals were rather mediocre. A pud consisting of cheese
and marmalade featured on several menus but we didn’t try it.
Eating when we were travelling was problematic are we
rarely saw anywhere to buy food. We took with us fruit cake and cereal bars which did an
adequate job of keeping us going. We drank bottled water although we had no reason to
suppose that the tap water wasn’t drinkable.
Money
The currency is the Peso which replaced the US Dollar as
the tourist currency in late 2004. We changed our sterling traveller’s cheques either
at the airport when we arrived or at hotels. However two of the hotels we stayed in were
not able to change currency (see later). We were advised that Euros are widely
accepted now that the US Dollar is out of favour.
Safety
We were never hassled or threatened. The reputation Cuba
has of being one of the safest countries in the world could be well-founded. We did
however twice meet officialdom in the form of characters who told us not to point our
scopes at (a) two decrepit fishing boats and (b) a possible military installation. It was
done politely though. We were stopped at a police checkpoint once. Again this was polite
and brief.
All photographs by Jim Rose unless otherwise stated. All photographs
copyright 2005.
Please contact the relevant photographer,
Jim Rose or
Dave Ferguson, if you wish to use any of
the photographs.