The Team BS adventure begins (that’s Team Beckstoffer-Stevens to you, friends!). Well, it actually began yesterday when we all rendezvoused at the Miami Crowne Plaza and had a great Latin lunch, wandered a flea market and then happy hour-ed our dinner at the Fresh Catch restaurant down the street (FYI – awesome steak sandwich – and yes, I know, not typical of what you’d order at a seafood place, but this is me…so….). We finished our night with our Friendly Planet tour Cuba briefing at the hotel to prepare for the trip. Yay – we’re on our way.
And on our way we are – at 5:15am for the shuttle to the airport. Early morning! The flight isn’t until 8:30 but the check-in process is a little bit, well, herky-jerky, thus the early hour. We have to stand in line for our boarding passes (not seated together), hand over our passports, get our visas, tell the counter agents how much we weigh (yep, they manually figure the plane weight!!) and then stand in yet another line to check our bags. Phew! Lots of waiting, queuing and waiting again – finally our passports are returned and since we were the last to check our bags – Ed is commissioned with holding onto all the bag tags for the groups’ checked luggage! Oh – the responsibility! At 7AM it might be too much for us to handle without coffee!
Throughout the ticketing process we are assessing our group of fellow travelers. We are a total of 20 – 15 who stayed at the Crowne Plaza, 2 at the Hilton and then 3 late comers who rushed in from their hotel as we were waiting to check our bags. Everyone seems friendly enough, although we do have one travel-mate who immediately starts a hub-bub over having to check her bag. She has “never” had to check her bag and makes quite a fuss about it. Of course, looking at the rest of the charter flight passengers and the flat screen tvs, huge boxes and bags, strollers, and other miscellaneous items that are coming on our plane to Cuba – it’s apparent why they have to eye ball all the luggage to see what will fit on the plane and what will not. It’s crazy! The people going back to see friends and family are hauling incredible amounts of stuff. Wild!
After that little scene, we decide to make a bee-line to security to wait out the rest of our time in the little seating area outside our gate.
Wheels up at 8:30, wheels down at 9;30 – we are here! First impressions: It’s hot, it’s Caribbean and rather like the airport in St. Thomas years ago – just without the open air spaces. We make it through passport control and onto baggage claim, handing in our health form along the way (sort of like a cruise form, but more detailed – have you had sniffles? Have you been close to anyone who has had sniffles? That type of thing. Don’t cough going through passport control or security before baggage!). While waiting for the bags, an adorable little cocker spaniel takes too much of an interest in Maggi’s carry on bag now sitting on the floor. The darn dog almost climbs into it! Ok – we’re sort of laughing, what a cute dog - but we admit – we are really holding our collective breath as the customs official/handler tries to get the dog out of the bag and back to its contraband sniffing duties! Phew! Finally it’s gone. Sigh of relief.
We finally grab our bags, have a quick round table discussion about what to do with the bag tags that are our responsibility – decide that we are about the last to get our bags and – well – we should be fine – so off we go out into the morning heat to meet our Friendly Planet guides! Steve, our tour guide is right at the door with his FP sign. He directs us to Julie, our local guide, who is inside the departure area guiding us to the money exchange. We can’t use any US dollars here – the only 2 currencies accepted are Cuban Pesos (used by Cubans) and Cuban Convertible Pesos (otherwise known as CUC’s and used by foreign visitors as well as Cuban locals).
American visitors must change their money into CUCs and there is a 13% fee charged. So for every $100, you get 87 CUCs. On top of that – we can’t use our ATM/Debit cards or credit cards. Because Cuba and the US don’t have any “relationship”, no American bank can do business in Cuba and vice versa. Means you have to bring enough money to last for the entire trip – and you have to manage it well so you don’t run out before the trip is over. Talk about strategy stress! Well, yeah, for me because we all know how anal I am – but it’s a completely different way of thinking when you know you can’t access any more cash!
Exchange done – we head back outside for our first look at Cuba. First impressions: the cars! We’d heard about the old cars – and there they were. Right in the parking lot as we arrived! More on that later…..
Off to the bus we go….and we are on our way!
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