Cienfuegos

Cienfuegos is a large city that is on the southern side of Cuba next to a bay, and the last place we are visiting. It was founded in 1819 by a French emigrant who moved from Louisiana and brought forty families from New Orleans, Philadelphia, and France to settle a new town. Their first settlement got destroyed in 1821 by a hurricane. After the hurricane they renamed the city from Fernadina de Jaagua to Cienfuegos in hope of good luck. After the Independence war the sugar farmers from Trinidad came to Cienfuegos and started to use their money to build up the city. Unlike the windy streets in Trinidad, Cienfuegos’ streets are arranged in an almost perfect grid.

Trinidad

Trinidad is a small city on the south coast of Cuba that got settled by Spanish Conquistadores in 1514. In the 17^th century the city was full of pirates and smugglers that were participating in the illegal slave trade.  In the 1800’s French refugees came and set up sugar mills. Soon sugar became the number one industry in the region. During the Independence Wars that started in the 1870’s the sugar plantations got destroyed and Trinidad started to go downhill. In 1950 President Batista passed a preservation law that recognized the historical importance. Today tourism is the number one industry.

Main Plaza of Trinidad

Biking Through Valle de Viñales

After we left Havana, we went to Viñales, a small-town west of Havana. We rented bikes to explore the Valle de Viñales. The valley is famous because of the mogotes, which are steep limestone Mountains with a flat top. The mogotes are all that are left of a huge cave system that collapsed millions of years ago. There are still smaller caves in the valley.  On the sides of the mogotes there are lots of plants and trees growing. In other parts it’s just bare rocks that some people climb. While we were biking, we noticed a lot of different types of trees, pines and palms and a lot of other ones we don’t know, growing at the bases of the mogotes.

The Cuban Revolution of 1959

Before the Cuban Revolution there was a president named Fulgencio Batista. Batista was the president in 1940-1944 and again in 1952 until the Revolution. During Batista’s first presidency he was fair and was trying to create a democratic constitution for Cuba. Before he finished his first term as president he made a deal with the American Mafia to let them do want they want in Cuba and he gets money from their gambling business. While we were in Havana we stayed in a neighborhood with a lot of mansions where the mafia had lived and had their businesses. Nowadays, most of the mansions are run down. Batista didn’t get reelected but used the military to get back into power in 1952 and become president again.

Fidel Castro was also running for president in 1952 but then Batista came in and took over and canceled the elections. That made Castro very mad. Then Castro decided to start a revolution to kick Batista out of the presidency. Castro’s forces attacked the Moncada barracks and got defeated and Castro got captured. After Castro got captured, he had a trial and because he was a lawyer, so he represented himself. During his trial he gave a speech that became famous, “History Will Absolve Me.” After his trial Batista decide to exile Castro to Mexico.

Street Art: Callejon De Hamel

Salvador Gonzales Escalona is a painter that spent over two decades painting in Cuba, America, Venezuela, Norway, and Italy. But then in 1990 he started to paint the rundown alley, Callejon De Hamel, outside of his apartment in Havana. He started with the sides of the buildings and then moved onto the streets and side walks with sculptures. There’re benches made of bathtubs and a throne that “bestows good luck.” We went to visit the alley because it was not too far away from one of the places we were staying and it was supposed to be cool (it was).

Classic Cars in Cuba

I first heard about classic cars in Cuba when a teacher from my school went there and made a presentation about his trip and showed it to my school. When we first got to Cuba I noticed classic cars right away. My English teacher shared an article about classic cars and why there are so many in Cuba. One of the main reasons is because there were many trade restrictions after the Cuban revolution in 1959. No new cars were being shipped from America and it was too expensive to bring in cars from different countries. Since the revolution there have been some cars shipped from China and Russia.

Tornado hits Havana

We got to Havana, Cuba, Sunday morning after a red eye flight. We settled into our apartment, went out for some dinner, and got back to the apartment. After we got back it started to rain. Then after an hour the power went out and it started to get very windy. The windows and shutters wouldn’t stay shut and were swinging around and water was pouring through the windows, even the ones that were closes. There were big puddles in the living room and bedrooms. It wasn’t until the next day we realized it was a tornado that hit Havana because we got texts from friends and family asking if we were okay.

After the storm it was a sunny view.
During the storm these were the shutters that were flapping around and we couldn't get the window shut.
We couldn't see the tall buildings in the background because of the rain.

The tornado hit south of where we are staying but we still got high winds and lots of rain in a very short time. It killed 3 people and over 170 were injured. Buildings collapsed and cars were flipped. Tornadoes are very rare in Cuba, this was the strongest one since 1940. The wind speed got up to about 320km/h. Tornadoes are classified into 5 different categories, F-0 through F-5. F-0 are the mildest and F-5 are the most dangerous. The tornado that hit Havana was a F-3. It was a very exciting welcome to Cuba.

Sources and storm photos:

• Washington Post
• The Guardian

Thera Volcano

by: Logan and Bryce

We spent our last week in Greece on the volcanic island Santorini. The volcano Thera erupted 3,600 years ago. After the volcano exploded the Minoan civilization based in Crete was destroyed and the eruption inspired a couple of myths.

Foods in Greece

pita slouvaki

While we have been traveling in Greece we have been trying different desserts and foods. One of our favorite foods is a chicken pita slouvaki. A slouvaki is a pita bread wrap usually filled with meat, french fries, tzatziki (yogurt and herbs), onions and tomatoes. Lots of times the meat is a kebab or gyro. A kebab is usually chicken or pork grilled on a stick and for the gyro the meat gets cooked on a rotisserie then it is shaved off into thin slices. We first had a slouvaki in Athens then we have tried it ever since. Today we had our best one in Oia on Santorini.

Greeks like their desserts at least we think so because there are so many pastry shops. We first discovered big  pastry shops when we were in Nafplio. Now it is our treat to stop at pastry shops in the different towns we visit. One of my favorite pastries is the Greek Kok. The Greek Kok is like a sponge cake sandwich with cream in between cakes and topped with chocolate.

We have also been cooking a lot at our apartments. In Chania we got oranges from our host's farm and made orange juice and it was pretty good. We have also been eating lots of feta cheese - I love the feta cheese.

The Kri-Kri Goat

Domestic goat on the side of the road in Crete

For my homework I had to write about an animal in Greece and I chose the Kri-Kri goat. The Kri-Kri goat lives in Crete mainly in the Samaria Gorge. We were going to hike on the Gorge but it was closed because of flooding. The Kri-Kri didn't always live in Crete it was imported to Crete during the Minoan civilization which was thousands of years ago. The Kri-Kri goat has two horns that go back from the head and brownish fur with a darker line around its neck.

Smart cars

While we have been traveling in Greece we have been noticing how many Smart Cars there are. We first noticed them in Athens. There were so many we saw them on almost every block. Now we see them in every town and city we go through. I can see why people would buy Smart Cars in Greece because the street are so small and the parking is so tight also if you had a Smart Car you could park in such small parking places. Yesterday we drove through a small town in Crete and it was kind of stressful to drive through because the roads were so small but with a Smart Car it would have been a lot easier. In Thssaloniki we saw 5 Smart cars on one block.

Facts about Smart Cars:

• A German company makes Smart cars but the factory where they are made is in France
• Their top speed is 95 MPH
• In 2017 Smart cars for U.S.A and Canada are going to be electric
• The cost starts at $15,000

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Athens

Olive Trees

We have been seeing lots of olive trees while we have been traveling in Greece. The first olive tree we saw was at the Acropolis in Athens. It was planted there because Athena gave the Ancient Greeks the olive tree when they chose to name Athens after Athena. We also got some olives at a market in Athens.

olive tree in Athens at the Acropolis

olive at a market in Athens 

Thessaloniki

We were in Thessaloniki for 3 nights. Thessaloniki is the second biggest city in Greece and is located in the north part of the country on the gulf of Thessaloniki. We did a walking tour of Thessaloniki and explored lots of ruins. Part of our route was to visit good bakeries. We took lots of pictures along the way and walked over 10 miles. 

one of the tower ruins

Meteora

Rocks with monasteries

We took a bus ride from Delphi to Meteora. Meteora is from the Greek word meteoros which means "suspended from air". I think it is called Meteora because there are tall rocks that are so high in the sky and when it is foggy it seems like you are in the clouds.

On top of the rocks there are monasteries. The monasteries were built in the 1300s and some are on rocks that are 1000 feet tall. The reason they built so high up is because they wanted to be safe from the Turkish people who were invading Greece. The monks got up to the monasteries by going into a net and getting pulled up or climbing up a ladder.

We got up to the  monasteries in a taxi then we hiked down a nice trail. When we were up there we noticed the monasteries were being built onto and were becoming fancier.

Town Of Nafplio

One of the fortresses

After we left Athens we went to Nafplio and spent 3 nights there. Nafplio is on the Peloponnese Isthmus in the Argolic Gulf. It was the first capital of Greece after Independence (1833-1834). Because of its location it had three fortresses. We visited two of the fortresses and one of them, the Palamidi, was 45 floors of stairs but when we got to the top it was closed because of a strike (we actually knew that it was closed, we just wanted to see the view). The next day we went to see the other fortress, Akronafplia. It had lots of cannons and it was on top of a hill but not as tall as the Palamidi. We did not visit the other fortress because it was on a little island but we did see it.

Streets of Athens

We were in Athens for 6 days and explored the streets and walked 30 miles. There were some things that I saw a lot of and they were Smart Cars, cats, caterpillars, street art, and ruins. Here are some pictures we took on our walks.

ruins

The Acropolis & Parthenon

Today we went to the Acropolis and saw the Parthenon and temples for Athena and Poseidon. It was kind of fun but we had to do lots of walking. The Parthenon is a big deal because it was considered to be the most perfect Greek temple. There were lots of temples for Athena and lots of statues of Athena because she is the goddess of Athens. She became the goddess of Athens because she offered the people olive trees and her competitor Poseidon offered the people a salt water spring. But the people chose Athena's gift of the OLIVE TREE!!!

view of the Acropolis

I'm in greece

It was a long flight to Greece but I finally landed in Athens. It is hard to get used to the time change and jet lag. We have been waking up at weird times and going to bed at weird times. One night we did not go to bed till 2:37 am we also woke up at 12:41 pm. The apartment that we are staying is close to a town square and in a pretty good neighborhood but most of the time there are a group of young men hanging out on our door step. One other thing about our neighborhood is there is a lot of graffiti (lots of graffiti on door). We are going to spend a week in Athens and explore the city.

Door to apartment

MAPS OF OUR TRIP

My dad and I made a map of the places we went to on our trip. We also took a picture of a map painted on a wall at our hotel in Palenque. We took buses to all of the places we visited.

Diario de Comida

During our trip we wrote a food diary (diario de comida) of all of the meals we ate. I liked the foods we ate on our trip. My favorite things were the tacos, quesadillas, salbutes and licuados. We ate at a lot of food stands and cooked some of our meals.

Here is my food diary of my last week in the Yucatan:

Desayuno Breakfast
Huevos Eggs
Rosquilla Doughnuts
Cereal con leche y frutas Cereal with milk and fruit
Tamales pollo con frijoles Chicken tamales with beans
Licuado pina con leche Pineapple smoothie with milk
Licuado melon con leche Cantaloupe smoothie with milk
Licuado sandia y platano con leche Watermelon and banana smoothie with milk