1. Havana Time Machine

    Posted in: Videos on Friday, December 2nd, 2011

    havana time machine

    Flying to Cuba is like taking a trip in a time machine.  Looking around Havana it’s easy to imagine you’ve been transported to the late 1950′s.  The city is not the exotic, bright, shiny, resort destination for the rich and famous that was 50′s Havana rather it’s more like a faded past her prime celebrity of another era.  There is enough familiar in the appearance to know it’s the same person who used to excite you, but the beauty has faded and the skin is sagging and wrinkled by the passage of time.

    The architecture and the automobiles are the most visible reminders of 1950′s Cuba.  The United States economic embargo against the island nation has resulted in more work for car mechanics and less work for new car salesmen.  The Detroit chrome and tailfin classics of  pre 1960 are everywhere.  And in a country with limited cash, there are also more old buildings than new buidings.

    But there is a promise of change in the air.  There are new rules allowing private ownership of homes and cars.  A facelift has begun.  Optimism for a better future is sprouting.  New rules now make it easier for U.S. citizens to get a special visa to visit Cuba and take direct flights from Miami.  If you want to experience this time travel adventure hurry before the country completely changes.  I just returned from a week long trip and this video shows a little of what Havana looks like today.

    This week on my radio show, National Geographic Weekend, I talk about the trip and share a little known Fidel story that was told to me by Roberto Salas, a photographer who was there chronicling the revolution 50 years ago.

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