Cuba - Part 2 - Varadero

Okay, so after two nights in Havana we took a bus back to our resort - we stayed at Sandals. (I'll just point out now that it was really difficult to go back there and be waited on hand and foot after being in Havana.)

The resort itself was way better than what we were expecting. This was our room:

It had lots of separate buildings rather than a massive hotel - which was very cool. The gounds were gorgeous too.

The first day (Monday) we arrived at the resort at 7:00am after no sleep on the plane (more to come on that later). We went up to our room, slept for a couple hours, then went out to explore.

We ended up at the bar and I had two drinks - a Manhattan and a 7 year aged rum - I had a totally empty stomach and was going on 2 hours sleep.

Then we went back to our room - that had a pretty well stocked bar (all free) and had another drink......so 2:00pm and I'm wasted.....at least I learned how to pace myself on the first day!

Anyway, we spent most of our time on the beach. There was a pretty nice outdoor bar/grill right on the beach....

As we were lying on the beach, they would come over and ask us if we wanted anything from the bar and bring it to you as you lied there like a slug on your lounger......I won't lie - it was pretty f***ing awesome. It was also weird not paying for anything - other than tips.

This was the first time either of us had stayed at a resort so we didn't really know what it would be like. This is what a lot of people did most of the time:

...which was totally not our scene. I'll admit - it was warmer here because the pools were sheltered from the wind. But they played music all day and there were people crammed too close together around the pool. The only time we stayed near the pool was after we had a drink at the swim-up bar - which was on my to-do list.

The other thing that blew my mind was there was free room service breakfast. You filled out what you wanted, hung it outside your door, requested a time for it to be delivered and they brought it to you room. We ate our breakfast on the balcony in the sun.

There was so much going on in the resort too - 4 restaurants to try (Italian, Caribbean, Seafood and the Beach Restaurant), there were 3 meals a day at the main buffet restaurant, a small creperie and coffee shop with live music at night, there were concerts on a big stage almost every night, lots of grounds to lie around on if the beach was cold and the pool isn't your thing and the rooms were comfy too - with private balconies.

So definitely worth the money for that type of trip - if you want to get away and not have to worry about anything other than what drink to order next, or which restaurant to try that night. But you don't get the cultural experience of Cuba - for that you have to do what we did and go off the resort.