Fodor's Expert Review Memorial Granma

A glass enclosure behind the Museo de la Revolución shelters the Granma, the yacht that transported Castro and 81 guerrillas back to Cuba from exile in Mexico in 1956. Bought from an American, the 38-foot craft designed to carry 25 (presumably unarmed) passengers nearly foundered during the week-long crossing. It eventually ran aground at Oriente Province in Eastern Cuba, but it was two days behind schedule. The saga gets worse: Castro's forces were ambushed and only 16 survived, including Fidel, Che, Raúl Castro, and Camilo Cienfuegos. The park around the yacht is filled with military curios: tanks, jeeps, the delivery truck used in the 1957 assault on the Palacio Presidencial, and an airplane turbine, allegedly from a U-2 spy plane downed during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.