Cuba Hotels

Havana City
The Cuban Capital is, without a doubt, the tourism destination of excellence of the largest of the West Indies. Within the city, its historic center (considered by UNESCO World Heritage in 1982) is an obliged reference destination for all visitors who come to this city. For centuries, this city has been considered the key to the Gulf (of México).

El Templete, a small neoclassic building finished inn 1828, is the place where the inhabitants of Havana celebrate, every November 16, the anniversary of the first mass and the first town council of San Cristobal de la Habana, and is also the start point of all tourism tours -in general- around the original center the Cuban Capital. The Parade Square is located just a few steps away, around which we can see the important Castillo de la Real Fuerza (1577) -which exhibits today the most important artistic pottery collection in the island, holding on its tower La Giraldilla, an artistic wind vane that has become a symbol of the city- The General Capitans' Palace (Museum of the City) and El Segundo Cabo.

Walking on the streets of Old Havana, many of them still cobbled, also represents the opportunity of getting acquainted with more than a dozen museums and studio-galleries of famous Cuban and Latin American fine artists; and visiting the houses of Benito Juárez, Asia, Africa, Puerto Rico, Arabs (with the only hall for Muslim prayers in Cuba), and Simón Bolívar.

Initially, the mining of gold and copper and the cultivation of coffee (introduced after the inflow of French immigrants) were, in the colonial times, the main economic activities of the a city, sieged by pirates, corsairs and the enemies of the Spanish metropolis; which required intense fortification work. The most important of its forts, Castillo de San Pedro de la Roca, was declared World Heritage by UNESCO in 1997.

Around 15 museums, including Bacardí –the first one built in the country; the paternity of two popular and transcendental musical rhythms: Son and Bolero; the prestigious institution of Orfeón Santiago; the fidelity to artistic expressions like Contredanse (which is said came as French and became Cuban), and the best carnival of the island; are cultural treasures jealously preserved, but also pleasantly shared with visitors, because Santiago is, above all, a city of open and cordial people.

The peaceful Cayo Granma (Key Granma), in the middle of the bay, is another attraction that has earned the preference of those who frequently visit a city that has become an important commercial venue in the region. The city organizes every year a meeting of business men and the EXPOCARIBE trade fair, a meeting followed by the Fiesta del Fuego (Party of Fire), where the treasures of the Caribbean culture are shown in their splendor.