17 'not to miss' things to see in Cuba

Lonely Planet Cuba

Lonely Planet Cuba travel guide

Cuba travel guide

- let your imagination spill over on the evocative cobbled streets of ‘Old Havana’

- roam the abandoned ruins of Antiguo Cafetal Angerona, a once-mighty coffee planta-tion

- hike in Soroa, the ‘rainbow of Cuba’, amid giant ferns and diminutive orchids

- get the lowdown on local life in the petite, sleepy island capital of Nueva Gerona

- explore Presidio Modelo, the ominous prison where Fidel Castro was once incarcerated

- see, smell and taste the agricultural beauty of the wonderfully authentic Unesco World Her-itage Site of Parque Nacional Viñales

- ride a horse or hike up with the guajiros into the pastoral Valle de Palmarito in the Parque Nacional Viñales

- indulge in a rare opportunity to dive and snorkel from the shore at Playa Coral beach

- stroll amid grand eclectic 19th-century architecture around Parque José Martí in Unesco-listed Cienfuegos

- people-watch from a cafe in the recently rejuvenated but, as yet, unspoiled colonial town of Remedios

- stroll without an itinerary around the recently renovated colonial streets of Sancti Spíri-tus
take the controls of a speedboat through the mangrove-fringed channels of the freshwater lake of Laguna la Redonda

- swim off the white-sand beach, the Playa Los Cocos, and soak up the culture of the tiny vil-lage of La Boca

- check out the Cuban version of the lasso-wielding cowboy in Parque 26 de Julio, the Las Tunas fairground hosting the city’s celebrated rodeo twice a year

- see Holguín spread out like a map beneath you from the heights of Loma de la Cruz

- trek up to Fidel’s wartime headquarters, Comandancia de la Plata, in Gran Parque Nacional Sierra Maestra.

- make an eco-escape to the luscious mountain getaway of El Saltón

- search for the world’s smallest frog in Parque Nacional Alejandro de Humboldt, the most diverse national park in the Caribbean

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