I'm starting this thread for all those who would like to post photos and videos of anything related to Cuba that you would like to share with the group here on the forum to help create a buzz. Please provide a bit of back-story to your entries for each as well. I'll start. Hopefully others will join in too. Terry


My wife and I in our casa kitchen dressed up to go out to Restaurante 1800 for a Christmas dinner with 3 other of our family members.

Me and my Cuban friends roasting the pig for 8+ hours in the front of our casa last New Years Eve. All of us enjoying lots of cervezas and ron too all day long, with other friends from the street dropping by for a chin-wag with the sweet aroma of that pork in the air. I'm not in the foto as I'm behind the camera.

Yordani working tirelessly to turn that pig all day long when roasting it to perfection. My job was to make sure that he always had a new ice cold cerveza beside his chair.

Yudith and I in front of the 2 story high Santa Claus out front of Restaurante 1800 in Camaguey city last Christmas. Great restaurant! Great times there always!

Great stuff Terry. Keep em coming.

My best Cuban friend and go-to-guy, Maikel - my Cuban brother really - standing in our kitchen and open to the outside back terrace of our casa. That guy is like my right hand there for whatever we need. Solid friend - through and through. I don't know what I would ever do without Maikel.

OK, Simon!! jajaja


The day Fidel Castro dropped by our casa here in Canada this past summer. jaja Actually, a friend here... he's originally from the DR. Uncanny resemblance though! He loves smoking my cigars too - and my HC Seleccion de Maestros rum. Good guy! His wife is our immigration lawyer for Yudith's and Delenys's PR application.

Yudith, my wife, working our Napoleon BBQ here in Canada this past summer via her TRV grilling our hamburguesas for lunch. Oje! She doesn't get a free ride - I make sure to always put her to work when she's here too. She loves it though!

Maikel, me, and Yudith down below, having fun in our casa's swimming pool together to help stay cool. Of course more ice cold beer and Cuba Libres were involved - when are they ever not??

A one-eyed Cuban friend of ours cracking open crabs in the back patio of our casa to fill a pot full of crab meat as part of our New Years Eve feast and festivities. I always contribute the pig, and the others contribute whatever they can bring. This guy is a fisherman who just got back from Playa Santa Lucia that morning with his booty from the sea to share with everyone. Yummy!

OK! It's someone else's turn! I know that many of you must have some great fotos of Cuba to share. I tried to upload a video... the video that Simon has already seen via text - you know, Simon, the video of Maikel up on our casa roof coaxing in the very first pigeon back from Pinar del Rio to Camaguey city into our pigeon coop - and then the very moment that Maikel then slips the band off of that pigeon's leg to shove it down into the registry box to register the time and become champion of all of Camaguey once again. But it tells me that I'm not allowed to upload that video in its mp4 format. I tried converting it to mov and avi - but still no luck.

Anyway, let's see some fotos from the rest of you. If you'd like to know more about the fotos that I've already posted, or have me upload more, please tell me. Btw, a pop quiz - who does Yania's face remind you of? A hint - at least as I see her - a female lead vocalist from an incredible '70's band. Just add blonde hair to Yania, and presto! It's too bad that Yania can't sing to save her life though. Terry

Very nice...

Wife and i enjoing a meal at "El Cacique" ( jibacoa area)

Hey there, Chris. Welcome aboard the Fodor's Cuba forum. Great foto of you and your Cuban wife, Aimee, at El Cacique in Jibacoa. It looks like you both ate very well there. Don't be a stranger now - it would be our pleasure here to have you always return and post regularly to both share your vast knowledge and experiences of your life and times in Cuba over many years (and within the Jibacoa area especially), as well as to bring your sharp wit to this forum too while doing so. This forum was made for good people such as yourselves. I'm personally looking forward to your next series of posts and/or fotos. Let me know if I can be of any further help to you as you begin to learn how to navigate the Fodor's Cuba forum to be able to utilize it to its fullest advantage. So glad you're here now, Chris. Good on ya! Terry

I noticed a can of Windmill beer in that picture. I drank a ton of those while trapped in Las Tunas during the pandemic. Welcome to the forum Jibacoa.

Five posts and four photos have been deleted. Please don’t engage in petty arguments nor overly personal or risqué photos.

Understood, Moderator1, and no problem. Duly noted. I'll try to keep my posted Cuba photos interesting - that's the main thing. However, most of my photos involve my Cuban family members and/or Cuban friends. I'll leave out anything that could even be vaguely misconstrued as risqué though. Terry

[img alt="Me and a few of my Cuban friends relaxing in our casa pool to beat the heat. Our baby Cuban crocodile joining us as well. Cuba Libres at the ready and the
Cuban salsa playing in the background. Terry "]https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fodors.com-vbulletin/780x1040/kladjofiule_a8b3d25da49a550a99a2a6cadfe0a2a9cbf08d 30.jpg[/img]
Me and a few of my Cuban friends relaxing in our casa pool to beat the heat. Our baby Cuban crocodile joining us in the pool as well. Cuba Libres at the ready and the Cuban salsa playing in the background. It's a tough life there without being on a Cuban resort. Can't wait to get back again soon for 24 more days of torture. Terry

Not sure why this photo didn't stick its landing before. Terry

I don't "know" you at all but I can make a couple of comments. I think the reasons this forum is moribund, and that's a shame, are multiple.

You, an a couple of others here know Cuba, have spouses and/or friends who live there, and have a very personal experience when you visit. That' wonderful for you...fantasric!
I had similar in Mexico many years ago.

But some posters, like me, are novices and are more interested in where to stay, how to get around, etc etc, from the perspective of a novice tourist to Cuba. Remember when I asked about upscale hotels? I got a response, if I recall correctly, from you and maybe one other poster, which was great, but that was it. And I was interested in more upscale tourist lodgings, which leave a lot of "regulars" out of the conversation. There is also quite a bit of side talk so that kind of leaves others out of the conversation.

Another issue, I think and I may be very wrong on this, is the many people come to the island on chartered vacations and do not stray far from the beach hotels, some of them AI's.
That would be the very last thing I'd be interested in myself, and for those people, their vacation is pretty much set before they arrive...they stay at their hotel, they eat at their hotel, and maybe they take a tour or two, from their hotel.

It's so much fun for you all to post photos and chat about the places you know, but I'm not sure that many people on this forum (remember the demographic of many, for example, and the fear of many Americans to even venture there....) would spend lots of time on this when they are mainly looking for info relevant to the "average," and often, fearful, tourist.

I read through all of your last post, and loved the photos, as you show a side of Cuba almost unaccessible to most tourists, especially first timers.

I might be all wrong here, but I do wish there was much more actitivy here. It's the same with all the destinations.... I'm hooked on Spain, for example, and even regarding that touristed country, posts are few and far between, with maybe 2 o3 three new ones per week, sometimes a bit more. The forum used to be so lively and now it's all about various games which Ii know nothing about and have never heard of, books and movies, and sometimes a few other subjects..... The Caribbean forum in total is about at the point of needing a breathing tube.....all those islands and look at how many new posts there are from the past six months; the only island that gets any attention is....Cuba!

I think Fodor's has lost "membership' in the past ten years or so. Is the moderation too heavy-handed? Are there just more online sites that travelers are using for trip planning these days? Or You Tube videos? Do people just follow "influencers?" Ii wish I knew because I used to look forward every morning to see the new posts, even if they were about countries I had no plan to visit.

Nowdays, it's very different.

Maybe you could, if you have not already, create a blog where you could really show off your nice photos, and give more readers insight into the Cuba that few visitors will ever get to know.

And you could link it here, and maybe even tell the story of how you became interested in Cuba, etc etc......

I hope I've not offended you. I hope you keep sharing, and I do hope that other people here will dig in to your posts. Very best, ek

ekscrunchy, thanks very much for your very well written post and heart felt observations. I could feel your emotions when reading your message. You made some very good points too. I think I'll still be here, but hiding in the shadows for awhile. I think I just need to give the Fodor's Cuba forum a rest for a bit as I've obviously become frustrated with the lack of back and forth on here. I don't mind helping to answer questions related to all things Cuba whenever possible, so I might jump back on if I see something worthy of my 2 cents worth. Thanks for noting my help to you too recently. I'm a bit of a chatter-box as you've probably come to know about me. I obviously like to talk about Cuba and share both my insights and my experiences as well in great detail. But without more responses to my posts, I'm feeling like I'm talking to myself more than half the time. And with that continuing silence from the rest of the membership, I'm also reading between the lines on that and feeling that perhaps I'm being perceived as more of a nuisance here and a blow-hard, rather than a help. Of course that's never been my intention though - I just like to be very thorough as an i's dotted and t's crossed kind of person. So I'm going to back away for a bit until someone either directly adds to this thread and requests my response, or if I see someone else post anything of significance where I feel that I can contribute some solid feedback. Of course I'll be completely off the grid while I'm away in Cuba for 24 days beginning on Dec. 18th as well. In the meantime, I'll remain on the down-low, and hopeful maintain that I haven't outlived my welcome and usefulness here. ekscrunchy, I wanted to thank you once again for your kind words and your obvious long-term wisdom on this forum. Cuidarte mucho! Terry