Cayo Coco, Cuba

Welcome to Travel the World with Shirley A. Roe, I hope you will enjoy my blogs on various locations around the world.

Cayo Coco, Cuba   Snorkeling paradise    Nov. 2012

It is late November and so far, no snow in southwestern Ontario. Dry roads for our one and half hour drive to the Toronto International Airport and our 3 p.m. flight to Cayo Coco, Cuba. Flight check in and boarding was easy with Sunwing and soon we were skyward.  Arriving in Cayo Coco at 7 p.m. the weather is humid and warm, a nice treat from the 0 C in Toronto! We are quickly ushered onto buses and given our room packages by a lovely young Cuban whose name is Marvela, or “Marvelous” as she chimes.  Mood is good and everyone is looking forward to a great two week vacation. We had been in Cuba seventeen years ago and our resort, food and beach were excellent. We expected a similar experience.

Memories Flamenco Resort is only 30 minutes from the Cayo Coco airport and we are met by smiling young women and men, carrying trays of non-alcoholic punch. We go to our room which is far from the main buildings and on the third floor. It has the lake and ocean view that we requested and we are impressed by the size and amenities we find. We make our way down to the beach, however at 8 p.m. it is dark, and we see little more than a boardwalk and a cabana. Tired, we find a bar and enjoy a drink anticipating tomorrow’s wondrous discoveries.

Morning begins at 7 p.m. and the sun is shining. As a coffee lover, I attempt to make coffee only to find the coffeemaker is broken. Definitely not a good start for someone that only wakes up after a good cup of java!  I stand on the balcony overlooking a dirt lot that one day will be a garden. Not impressive at the moment.  Leaving our building we walk the cobbled paths through the resort. Small vehicles driven by workers use the paths and are constantly wanting past. Several of the gardens are freshly planted and will be lovely in two or three years’ time. We make our way to the breakfast buffet and find a table for two. The room is large but filled with people. I order coffee and go to find something tempting on the buffet. After 10 minutes, no coffee and now I am starting to panic. (Not literally, but I really need a coffee) Finally a waiter appears and fills our cups half full of a strong black liquid. My husband’s cup is filled with milk however, I drink mine black. The young man leaves me staring into my half empty or half full cup; I look up to see my husband smiling. He knows exactly what I am thinking. The coffee disappears in two gulps and I am anxiously looking for the waiter who appears to have disappeared. The buffet offered a good selection of eggs, bread, meat, cheese and vegetables but the fruit was very disappointing. Pale watermelon, more white than pink, dry pineapple and melon that appeared to have been frozen, sat unappealing on the buffet table, very disappointing to someone that loves fresh fruit and always found it in the islands on previous trips.

 With breakfast concluded, we move off to explore the resort and the beach. Our first stop is the Towel hut for our beach towels. We are greeted by a short Cuban, with an apologetic look on his face, who says, “Sorry, no towels. You come back later.” I stop at customer service and report the coffeemaker is broken and request a new one.  We wander to the beach to discover that it is covered in coral rock and access to the water is very limited, thus the boardwalk. Visitors are encouraged to walk to the end of the boardwalk and enter the water by the stairs to avoid the sharp, rocky bottom. Water shoes are a must for this location.

We decide to take a walk. We pass several chaise lounges and a sign that reads ‘Diamond Club Only’ and are greeted anxiously by a man wanting to find us a seat. We decline and move further along where more, less comfortable chaise lounges are on offer for those of us that didn’t pay the extra $150 each for Diamond Club. Here the man in charge of cleaning the chaise lounges is sleeping soundly on one of the offerings.  We continue walking on the white sand admiring the wild, stubby and very thick brush that lines the shore. The water is a turquoise blue and very calm. After an hour and a half, we return to the Towel hut where the same fellow says, “Sorry, no towels. You come back later.” We go to our room to prepare for lunch.

Lunch buffet is less appealing. Pork chops are too hard to cut with a knife, so I have vegetables and bread. My husband is a seafood lover and finds some edible fish. After lunch we decide to sit by the pool, since we have no towels and at least the chaise lounges are better. The pool area is large and very attractive. The sun is warm and there is a breeze making the afternoon very enjoyable. We return to our room to find that the maid has cleaned the room and removed all of the towels, even though they were on the rack, not the floor. Now we are left with one small hand towel! Also the coffeemaker has not been replaced. I call the customer service, who tells me “Later.”

Dinner is acceptable and the soup is very good, however once again the meat is overcooked and hard. We take a nice walk around the complex after supper before settling in the bar for a nice drink. Assuming that the maid has returned to the room with towels, we retire to find that this is not so. No towels for a shower and we can’t use the beach towels, because we don’t have one!  Fortunately, the beds are comfortable and we have a good rest.

Next morning, with no coffeemaker, we hurry into the buffet. Another 10 minute wait for coffee, but this time I tell the waiter to fill the cup to the top. We eat and visit the Towel hut. “No towels. You come back later.” Now I am not impressed. We can’t go to the beach or the pool without a towel and now we don’t even have a bath towel in the room that we could have used. I go to customer service, stand in line behind about ten other guests and then make a written complaint. She assures me we will have towels today. The toilet paper is running low and not being replaced and our sheets have not been changed. I make a call but receive no satisfaction.

To make a long story short, we arrived on Tuesday night and it was Friday at 5 p.m. before we got beach Towels and bath towels!   Not the five star service that we thought we had paid for.

Our friends arrived on Saturday for one week. They had to wait two hours for their room and had no bottled water when they finally checked in.  The next morning, we enjoyed a lovely beach walk to the end of the point. We swam in a quiet shallow lagoon and the sun was shining, a glorious day. The following day, the four of us take the local sightseeing bus for five Cuban dollars each and travel to the well- known and much talked about, Pillar Beach. An open air restaurant greets travellers at the end of a long board walk. Chaise lounges are offered at $2 each, we decline. After walking five minutes on the sand, we are stopped by very rocky outcroppings that are impossible to climb without good hiking boots. We turn and go the other way, only to find another rocky outcropping ten minutes down the beach. The wind is ruthless and blowing sand in our faces and the water is very rough. We are not impressed and decide to make our way back to the bus. We discover that the bus is not coming for an hour and a half. When it finally arrives, we take the entire Cayo Coco tour and see several other resorts before returning to Memories Flamenco.

Next day, we go on our excursion, The Boat Adventure. A bus picks us up at the hotel and we travel to the other end of Cayo Coco. Here we are given life jackets and each couple is given their own small motorboat. Our friends are hesitant, having never driven a boat but it is very easy and they soon relax. A convoy of small craft leave the dock and we travel at full speed across a lake, through the mangrove swamps to a small lagoon. Here we snorkel in the inlet. The water is not clear and the current makes swimming up the lagoon difficult. We do see fish on the bottom, but it is not great snorkelling. However the dock is large and my friend and I enjoy lying in the hot sun while the men snorkel. We travel back in our small motorboats and find the experience fun and exhilarating. I would recommend it as a fun excursion for less than $50 each. Each participant receives a free snorkel. A tip is well deserved and appreciated by the staff.

Our friends are considering a trip to Havana by plane. It is an all day tour and the cost is $189 each.

The rest of the week is spent trying to stay out of the sand blasting wind on the beach and made the temperature too cool to enjoy the water. The water is rough and not suitable for snorkelling. There are several small jellyfish in the water.  We avoid the beach for awhile. While sitting on our balcony, my husband is bitten by tiny no-see-um’ flies and the next morning he has more than one hundred bites. He had sprayed with off but to no avail. I used Skin so Soft, by Avon and had only two bites but bugs don’t normally bite me. The wind continues to blow, but when it stops the temperature goes up and the bugs appear.

Our friends departed the following Saturday, just as the wind dropped to a warm, pleasant breeze. The water calms and the air is warm. We decide to go snorkeling. The crystal clear water is very inviting and after wading in waist deep, we relax on the top of the water, snorkels and mask in place. We are immediately impressed by the colourful fans and plants growing on the bottom. Fish of every description hug the plants, dozens of fish moving in rhythmic harmony with every wave, back and forth. Yellow French Grunts, Blue Striped Grunts, Black eyed Squirrelfish, blue and purple parrot fish, blue Tangs, and tiny pink, and black fish swim in and out of the coral formations.  Under a coral ledge, we spot two lion fish and spend quite a bit of time observing them. My husband takes several underwater pictures. The highlight was a four foot Barracuda who swam precariously past, its steely eye observing our every move. Needless to say, we come out of the water exhilarated and satisfied that all is not lost with this vacation. We spend the next three days snorkeling and totally enjoying the beach.

I would not recommend Memories Flamenco due to the poor service, mediocre food and would have to say it is a three star resort at best. Although the resort is not responsible for the bugs, they are a deterrent and travellers should be wary of Cuba for this reason. On the flight home, the woman next to me stayed at Cayo Guillermo and was suffering from an allergic reaction to bug bites, both fire ants and flies. She had seen a doctor but was in agony for the entire flight.

I must admit that our previous vacation in Cuba was excellent and I have spoken to several other travelers that have had wonderful results in Cuba. I am just sharing our experience and we trust you will make your own decision now that you have the facts. I hope this has been informative and will assist you in your choice of travel destinations. Stay tuned for more travel blogs. 

Rating        ***

 

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Shirley A. Roe, author, reviewer and traveller.