Daydreaming about a getaway to an overwater bungalow suspended over cerulean water?
You don’t need to tap your retirement savings for a trip to some far-flung, ultra-luxury property in the Maldives or French Polynesia.
As Coastal Living points out, there are plenty of sublime overwater bungalows closer to home than you might imagine. And it only takes a few hours to get to them from several U.S. cities. Best of all, you can fly to all of these overwater stays for less than $400 round-trip. You’ll still need to pay for the bungalow, but cheap airfare will get you half way to total relaxation.
From white-sand beaches in Mexico to underrated destinations in Central America — and one very glamorous Caribbean retreat — these overwater bungalows leave nothing to be desired.
Fly to Azul Paradise in Panama for $368 round-trip.
According to Scott’s Cheap flights, flights to Panama are seriously on sale right now, with fares starting at $368 round-trip this summer. Travelers can leave a early as late May from Boston, Las Vegas, and Orlando, and stay in one of 10 intimate bungalows at Azul Paradise, in Bocas del Toro. Panama City is just over three hours from Orlando, with short, hour-long regional flights to archipelago’s main village, Bocas Town.
Visit the Rosewood Mayakoba for $279 round-trip.
New York area travelers can fly to Cancun in four hours, and be immediately transported to a white sand paradise.
Courtesy of Rosewood Mayakoba
Deluxe Overwater Lagoon Suites at the Rosewood Mayakoba — about a 40-minute drive from Cancun in Riviera Maya) — are ultra-modern and suspended over a freshwater lagoon.
Check out Jamaica’s new overwater villas for $379 round-trip.
A collection of new Over-the-Water Villas at the Sandals Royal Caribbean is probably going to change your entire outlook on all-inclusive resort stays. Nightly rates are high, but they’re completely all inclusive (even your cocktails, golf outings, and scuba diving). And this summer, flights to Montego Bay are available for only $379 round-trip from Atlanta.
Fly to Belize for $346 round-trip.
In about seven hours, you can be in the beautiful Central American country of Belize.
Courtesy of Cayo Espanto
Two properties with overwater bungalows really shine here, including the one-bedroom villa with turquoise shutters at Cayo Espanto and the five stilted bungalows at the private island resort, Thatch Caye.
LIONFISHGulf Coast Lionfish Coalition officials talk about roundup | 3:54
Gulf Coast Lionfish Coalition officials talk about the group’s roundup. Bruce Graner/[email protected]
LIONFISHLionfish festival | 3:22
Robert Turpin talks about Lionfish Awareness Day and how to safely fillet a lionfish. Kimberly Blair/[email protected]
LIONFISHLionfish Removal and Awareness Day-HD | 1:30
Lionfish Removal and Awareness Day- How many lionfish can Florida remove in one weekend? The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission needs your help to find out. Celebrate the first annual Lionfish Removal and Awareness Day (May 16, 2015) Video by Joe Kistel and KistelMedia.com
LIONFISHEdible Invaders makes lionfish dip | 0:33
Chef Meaghan Martizez from Pensacola’s Edible Invaders makes lionfish dip.
A new documentary set to debut in Pensacola later this month looks at the growing threat invasive lionfish pose to Florida’s recreational fishing and seafood industries.
“Reef Assassin” explains how the colorful and venomous fish with lion-like manes of feathery fins have thrived in the waters off Florida since they were first dumped by aquarium collectors in the mid-1980s.
Three decades later, lionfish are a threat to most other species in waters stretching from the Caribbean Islands to the mid-Atlantic states of the U.S., said filmmaker Maribeth Abrams.
“It was very eye opening for me to be part of the investigation that we did for this project,” said Abrams, producer, editor and narrator of the Skyline Films project.
Abrams and her crew traveled throughout Florida and to Newfoundland, Canada, and Barbados while gathering information for the 55-minute film. Much of the filming happened in the Florida Panhandle — the region considered to be Florida’s lionfish capital because of the high numbers of the fish found in area waters.
The film draws parallels between the collapse of Newfoundland’s cod fishing industry decades ago to the present-day threat posed by lionfish to native fisheries around Florida.
“Because of over-fishing, the fish that were being caught were not being replaced. We talked to people (in Newfoundland) who lived through the collapse, and they describe a very, very bleak situation,” she said. “We look at what happened when a culture that is dependent on fishing no longer has fish to catch.”
Among those interviewed for the project was Robert Turpin, Escambia County’s director of marine resources.
Turpin, who is helping organize Pensacola’s third annual Lionfish Roundup event on May 20 and 21, said some progress is being made in the lionfish fight.
Area spear fishermen collected more than 8,000 lionfish from Pensacola-area reefs during the 2016 Lionfish Roundup, he said.
And, Turpin said, researchers are coming up with better ways to trap lionfish in deep waters.
Lionfish cannot be caught with a traditional rod and reel. The best way to remove them is through spear fishing, which is expensive and labor intensive.
“The traps have been a source of great optimism, at least in my mind, because they can more effectively remove the lionfish compared with scuba divers whose bottom time is limited by air capacity,” he said.
And traps can access deeper waters that are out of reach for divers, he said.
Also interviewed for the film was Candy Hansard, president of the Destin-based Emerald Coast Reef Association. The nonprofit encouraged the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to enact its Panhandle Pilot Program, which provides tags allowing divers who collect large numbers of lionfish to collect greater numbers of desirable fish like cobia and red grouper.
But, Hansard said, the state and federal government should provide lionfish harvesters with even more tags for commercially desirable fish, including red snapper, trigger fish and amber jack. And the tags should be provided year round, not just when the season for a specific species is open, she said.
“What we are trying to do is to have our state and federal leaders wage an all-out war on the lionfish. In order to do that, we are going to have to recruit tens of thousands of divers to go out and slaughter fish aggressively, but right now there isn’t really any motivation for them to that,” she said.
Hansard said rewarding lionfish harvesters by allowing them to bring in greater numbers of commercially desirable fish appears to be the best option for curbing lionfish growth, she said.
The lionfish, native to the waters of the Indo-Pacific region, is a voracious eater that lays millions of eggs and has no known predators in the Gulf of Mexico. Lionfish devour the fry of native fish species, including grouper, red snapper and trigger fish and juvenile shrimp and crabs.
“The crisis is so huge that if we don’t take very aggressive action very quickly, we are risking catastrophic damage to our native fisheries and everyone who depends on those fisheries, from charter fishing to commercial fishing,” Hansard said. “We are talking billions of dollars in economic destruction.”
The Pensacola debut of “Reef Assassin” is scheduled for 7 p.m. May 20 at Hagler Auditorium on the campus of Pensacola State College.
The filmmakers plan to film a panel discussion with questions from the audience following the film screening. Portions of that could be used in the followup documentary, the filmmakers said.
This could be the most ambitious adventure to date. Nose-diving into the great unknown, Stockton Rush, a former aerospace engineer, is braving new depths in sub-aquatic tourism, delving deeper than ever before – to Titanic levels.
But you may well need to liquefy some of those assets before you jump aboard.
His bucket-list topper trip to explore the Titanic for eight days in 2018 will set you back a cool $105,129 (£81,420). No surprise then, that in less than six months and with no ad campaign, it’s already sold out – to the same nine guests who’ve booked up Virgin Galactic’s maiden flight.
But for the man who not only owns but also builds his submarines, the universe is no competition.
“In the vacuum of Space, by definition there is nothing. That means a great view, but the final frontier for new life forms and discovery is undersea – for the next 200-300 years at least,” he told The Independent.
Rush always wanted to become an astronaut, but after his aerospace degree from Princeton and engineering work on the US fighter programme, he was told that his 20/25 eyesight wouldn’t make the cut for an air force pilot.
Rush is leading super-expensive tours of the Titanic (Ocean Gate)
“I thought I’ll make enough money to buy my way into space”, he says. And sure enough, after a period in investment banking, Rush found himself at the Virgin Galactic launch, watching Richard Branson standing on the wing of SpaceShipOne, heralding a new age of Space tourism. The penny dropped.
Casting off from the stars, he set his sights on the seas.
A keen scuba diver from the age of 12, Rush decided he wanted an experience where you needn’t worry about running out of air, feeling cold and equalising your ears.
“I wanted to sit in a submarine and watch crabs fighting to the sound of Mozart for two hours,” he says.
But subs for rent are few and far between. And that’s without the cost of getting them to you, which if you’re in London could be up to £77,500. Rush decided he could steer submarine trips into the fastest growing segment of the travel industry – adventure travel, worth $275bn (£213bn) per year, according to the Adventure Travel Trade Association.
Exploring depths previously the exclusive remit of government submarines, Rush now has three vessels. The one he’s working on at the moment, Cyclops III, will go to 6,000m far deeper than any commercial sub out there.
“Shallow dives equal shallow experience. The commercial subs out there are like a Disneyland ride versus paddling yourself through the Grand Canyon. Knowing you’re there changes how you observe it.”
Since 2009 his Washington-based company Ocean Gate has sunk former Everest climbers, moviemakers and nautical archaeologists into the deep. Age is no barrier for his adventure-minded clients – he’s had guests as old as 92 and as young as 12 on each four to five person vessel.
But, Rush warns, “it’s not a chocolate-on-the-pillow job – you’re part of the crew. If there’s an electric charge that needs moving in the middle of the night, we’ll grab you.”
So what makes the superb sub passenger? A good sense of humour, no strong odours and being a team player, he says. If you tick those boxes, you could soon be catching what Rush calls the ‘deep sub disease’. This is when you see below the 1000ft ‘deep scattering layer’, where the marine life that doesn’t reach the surface lurks. He got it straight after his very first sub dive in British Columbia 2006.
“I kept going deeper – I couldn’t believe it. I thought when I get to the bottom there’ll be a couple of octopuses playing chess down there.”
In this part of the sea skulk the creatures too low even for fishnets to catch.
“They communicate with light flashes so it’s like you have multicoloured stars flying everywhere, attracting mates, finding food, distracting predators in a totally different universe.”
Almost every time you go on a sub you see something that’s never been seen before. A National Institute of Health project to collect biological samples from 200-1000 feet in the waters off Papua New Guinea collected nine new species per hour.
Such tourism research will anchor Rush’s slightly more budget Bahamas trip – costing a mere £10,000 and upwards for 3 days, to see deep dwelling sharks interact with their surface cousins at depths of up to 500m. But he plans to make headway in mass market accessibility once the wealthier clients have buoyed up affordability and tech advances, also envisaging voyages to other wrecks.
But then he plans to sink us deeper. Top of his list is to be the first commercial sub to go to ‘hydrothermal vents’ – the gaps between shifting tectonic plates where hot water gushes out that make up the largest mountain range on earth -the undersea mid-continental ridge stretching from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
Stockton Rush is leading tours into the depths where deep sea creatures look more like aliens (Ocean Gate)
One part of them, nicknamed the ‘Lost City’, is home to six-foot tube worms and giant crabs – creatures of the deep that led NASA to think alien life forms could exist on Jupiter and Saturn’s watery moons.
But the best thing he’s seen so far is rather more down to earth. Off Catalina Island near LA, Rush remembers being in the back dome, 500 feet down and sharing a moment with a squid.
“A squid has an eye that looks just like a human eye, they have same visual acuity. It came along and just stared at me, like there was nothing between us. It was so curious and kept looking. There was no question it was thinking exactly the same as me – what the hell is this thing doing here?”
The town of Chichiriviche de la Costa is a small gem on the Venezuelan coastline, set in a tranquil bay where a freshwater river runs through the mountains and empties into the sea. The locals live in the hills just above the beach, consisting of a few hundred people whose income is derived from fishing and local tourism opportunities. Coral reefs live on both sides of the bay, accompanied by a wide diversity of marine life. A variety of medusa and sea sponges frequently attract Hawksbill sea turtles which are commonly found feeding on the beach. Upwellings occur twice a year, providing important phytoplankton and zooplankton blooms which entice various species of sardines and herring. In turn, cetaceans and whale sharks are commonly seen during September through March each year. Unique marine life including frogfish, sea horses, crustaceans, nudibranks, mollusks, sea cucumbers, crinoids, sea stars, anemones, tunicates, clams, oysters, and sea urchins are also common to Chichiriviche’s waters. Not surprisingly, the bay and nearby coastline are excellent for scuba diving and snorkeling, with easy access from the beach.
The unparalleled beauty and vibrant sea life of Chichiriviche continue to draw crowds of beach-goers and marine enthusiasts to its coastline. However, short-term visitors have little awareness of the importance in preserving the beach and ocean environment, resulting in negligence and pollution. Venezuelans traveling from Caracas, a mere two-hour drive from Chichiriviche vacation right on the beach and unknowingly interfere with marine life. For example, the bay is a vital nesting site for turtles but with the increase in beach activity, lights and noise, their presence has greatly diminished. Coral reef species like Acropora palmata are critically endangered due to the impacts of rising sea temperatures and the river discharging contaminants into the ocean.
Interest in diving, in particular, has led to the opening of two scuba diving schools. The scuba divers are passionate about their local marine flora and fauna and work with the local community to become better stewards of their environment. However, inexperienced scuba divers with poor buoyancy control break the few surviving corals.
BIOSub is a group of Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV) students blending marine science and conservation with underwater activities (SCUBA diving, freediving, spearfishing), while supporting biological research projects. BIOSub in collaboration with CECOBIO, both extension groups from UCV’s Faculty of Science, are currently designing a conservation project aiming to improve the general value of Chichiriviche’s coral ecosystem. Rubén Niño is currently studying Biology at UCV and fell in love with coral reef freediving. Working at one of Chichiriviche’s local dive centers has given him a unique perspective on coral reef ecosystems underwater and local activities on land. One of his goals is designing sustainable fishing techniques while educating locals, divers and tourists to become more aware of the environment and in turn, care about it. He remarks;
“Many experienced divers say Chichiriviche’s coral population has diminished dramatically in time from a combination of environmental conditions and irresponsible fishing and diving. If we don’t act now, all of those beautiful dive sites will be gone in the near future, but we still have time. Education is the key to conservation.”
Strength in Awareness
The connectivity of Hope Spots has remarkably established an important link with Choroni, a neighboring community, also a Mission Blue Hope Spot. Marco Caputo, a Marine Biologist from Choroni joined forces with a conservationist from Chichiriviche, Gabriela Chirinos, to educate their residents about the Hope Spot. The two experts led a lively discussion on their collaboration with Mission Blue, Choroni’s successful sea turtle project, and a discourse on coral reefs. Hosting the event at a dive school garnered interest from over 30 people including members of the National Guard. The outcome resulted in future plans for local residents to become more involved in their Hope Spot while strengthening relationships with the diving community.
BIOsub, in particular, is leading efforts in coral and algae research, beach clean-up activities, and training and educating locals about diving. Exciting plans are also underway for a Reef Check representative to train a team of local divers on how to monitor their reefs through data collection and surveys.
Gregg Magrane, one of Chichiriviche’s Hope Spot champions exclaims;
“Conservation is a strategy for sustainability and generational justice, namely a sense of fairness for future generations. In our conservation efforts, we are in the process of increasing the consciousness of the tourists, divers, fishermen and local inhabitants. We feel making everyone aware is the best way to ensure the environment is not destroyed. Our Hope Spot nominations have given us concrete foundations to go forward with this ideal and with preserving healthy marine environments for Choroni and Chuao and Chichiriviche de le Costa.”
Many beach resorts offer a few hours of scuba training, then a dive, which may seem like going from a crawl to a run. That being said, that doesn’t mean that it isn’t safe.
Ultimately, the safety of the course-then-dive offered at a resort depends on the quality of instruction and your comfort level with being underwater. Daylong resort intro courses don’t provide actual certification, just enough know-how to try things out, says Alex Brylske, Ph.D., author of The Complete Diver. Group dives are limited to a max depth of 40 feet and avoid “overhead environments,” like caves or shipwrecks. And the next vacation, you have to take the class all over again.
“Some people have great experiences” with starter-type classes, Brylske says. But currents and visibility can create danger, and shoddy operators are a risk. So if you go this route, ask if your outfitter follows Recreational Scuba Training Council (RSTC) rules.
A much better idea? Get your “C card” (open-water certification) before you go. “A typical course takes about 30 hours over six to 10 weeks, starting in a pool then moving to open-water dives,” says PA-based diving teacher Brett Galambos.
Sound like a lot of work? Consider the reward: a lifetime of diving reefs in Bonaire and shipwrecks off the Florida Keys.
If you’re anything like me, you may find that planning and counting down for a trip abroad is one of the most exciting parts of traveling.
Have a date set for your trip to Cuba? Or considering visiting the island now that travel restrictions for Americans have been eased?
These helpful tips and suggestions are just for you:
1. Think logistically: Why am I going to Cuba?
Under current rules, U.S. citizens must fall under one of 12 categories to qualify for a general license to travel to Cuba. Those 12 categories include things like family visits, journalistic activities, humanitarian projects, educational and religious activities.
You do not have to apply for a general license to visit Cuba, but you do have to be able to prove that you fall under one of the 12 categories of approved travel.
When I visited Cuba in January 2017, I did this by writing out an itinerary for my trip weeks in advance. I kept that itinerary with me as I traveled around the country.
It’s up to you to make sure your trip fulfills one of the current requirements.
An American in Cuba – 2017
A purple classic car drives through Central Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A woman stands on a balcony surrounded by laundry hanging on a clothesline in Old Havana, Cuba, January 12, 2017. (Hannah Button)
School children play a relay game in Havana, Cuba, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A classic car parked in the streets of Old Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Museum of the Revolution in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A man holds a coconut in Havana, Cuba, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Two men chat in a street in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Ladies in colorful clothes show off their baskets of flowers in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A walkway into a home in Havana, Cuba, January 12, 2017. (Hannah Button)
People sit at the counter in a cafeteria in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Young Cubans connect to wifi at a park in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A street mural of Cuban revolutionary Che Guevara in Old Havana, Cuba, January 12, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A woman prepares food at a paladar in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A woman shops at a food stand in Trinidad, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A cat lounges in front of a home in Old Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A colorful flower canopy next to a restaurant in Trinidad, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
The sun sets behind a palm tree in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A man waits for customers to buy fruit in front of his home in Trinidad, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A classic car drives down a narrow street in Trinidad, Cuba, January 15, 2017. (Hannah Button)
People walk through the colorful streets of Trinidad, Cuba, January 15, 2017. (Hannah Button)
People relax at a beach in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A classic car is parked in front of colorful homes in Trinidad, Cuba, January 15, 2017. (Hannah Button)
The ocean is seen in the distance from the historic center in Trinidad, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A man skips rocks at a beach in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Two men sit on a street across from the beach in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Colorful homes lines the streets of Trinidad, Cuba, January 15, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A woman stands on a balcony in Central Havana, Cuba, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A beach in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
People walk through the streets of Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Tourists and locals pack into classic cars along the coastline in Havana, Cuba, January 17, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A woman watches her cat in front of her home in Old Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Overlooking the streets of Central Havana, Cuba from a balcony, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
The Great Theatre of Havana illuminated at night in Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A pink classic car drives through Old Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Kids stand in the streets of Central Havana, Cuba, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A street musician plays at night in Old Havana, Cuba, January 13, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Two women in the streets of Old Havana, Cuba, January 12, 2017. (Hannah Button)
El Capitolio under construction seen from Old Havana, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A rocky beach in Havana, Cuba, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
A building through a window in Central Havana, Cuba, January 11, 2017. (Hannah Button)
To get into Cuba you will need:
A passport: Your U.S. passport must be valid at least 6 months after your return date.
A 2-part visa: After booking your flight, your airline will instruct you to purchase a tourist/visa card. Some airlines give you the option of purchasing your visa ahead of time so that it’s ready to pickup at the airport before your departing flight. Others will tell you to be prepared to purchase the visa once you arrive at the airport.
Airlines like Southwest have deals for discounted visas with Cuba Travel Services.
You will need to hold onto your visa once you’re in Cuba. Border control agents will ask for your visa and passport before you are allowed to leave the country.
Don’t forget to keep track of everything you do while you are in Cuba. The U.S. government may request information about your trip for up to 5 years.
2. To beach or not to beach? Choosing a destination
The sun sets behind a palm tree in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
For a first-timer in Cuba, visiting the capital city of Havana is likely a must. The city’s rich culture, storied history and impressive architecture are just some of the many reasons it attracts tourists from all over the world.
While I highly recommend a trip to Havana, keep the following in mind: It is not a place to lounge at the beach. Havana’s rocky beaches are beautiful, but not ideal for a traveler looking to dig their toes into the sand and drink straight from a coconut.
But, fear not! Traveling to other parts of the island from Havana is do-able and worthwhile. The island of Cuba is vast and diverse, and you’re going to want to experience as much of it as you can while you’re there.
If you’re into idyllic beaches, check out these cities:
Trinidad, Cuba: Hire a taxi or hop on the Víazul bus to travel from Havana to this UNESCO World Heritage site. Trinidad is a colorful colonial town known for its proximity to the white sandy shores of Playa Ancón, one of Cuba’s most picturesque beaches. Rent bikes or hire a rickshaw for your quick journey to the beach. Make it an overnight trip and stay with a local family to get the full Trinidad experience.
People relax at a beach in La Boca, Cuba, January 16, 2017. (Hannah Button)
Varadero: If resorts are your thing, Varadero is the place for you. Just over a 2-hour drive from Havana, this tourist hot spot offers all-inclusive hotels, spas and golf courses. Go snorkeling at Coral Beach and visit Ambrosio Cave where you can marvel at aboriginal rock drawings that are more than 2,000 years old.
Ana Guevara, of Mexico, practices her swing at the Varadero clubhouse in Varadero, Cuba. (AP Photo/Franklin Reyes)
Cayo Coco: If you’re planning a long trip to Cuba and enjoy lush, tropical landscapes and exotic wildlife, consider an excursion to Cayo Coco. The island sits off central Cuba and can be reached by airplane or causeway, where you may be lucky enough to spot flamingos that live in the bay’s shallow waters. Stay at one of the island’s many resorts and relax on long, white sandy beaches. Go scuba diving off Cayo Coco’s northern coast and explore the largest coral reef in the Western Hemisphere.
Flamingos walk in a lake in Cayo Coco, in Ciego de Avila, Cuba. (AP Photo/Franklin Reyes)
Viñales to Cayo Jutías: Take a taxi or ride the Víazul bus to get from Havana to Viñales, a small town in northwestern Cuba known for its stunning natural beauty and tobacco farms. The town serves as a gateway to Viñales Valley, a UNESCO World Heritage site rich with glaring limestone cliffs and lush landscapes. Travel through the valley on horseback and visit a a Cuban tobacco farm to see how the country’s world-famous cigars are made. Rent a scooter or take a 1-hour taxi ride from Viñales to Cayo Jutías to enjoy an afternoon on an isolated beach with crystal clear waters.
Tobacco picker Romerio Garcia collects leaves at the Alfredo Rojas farm in Viñales, Cuba’s western province Pinar del Rio. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
3. Exchange your U.S. currency ahead of time
Cuba is unique in that it dispenses 2 types of currencies: the locally-used Cuban Peso (CUP) and the Cuban Convertible Peso (CUC) which is what you will exchange your foreign currency for. The CUC has a 1:1 exchange rate with the U.S. dollar.
However, there is a 10% penalty to exchange USDs for CUCs, in addition to the standard 3% fee. To get around this, you can exchange your USDs for another foreign currency, like Euros or Canadian dollars, before you head to Cuba.
While U.S. banks have their own service fees for foreign currency exchanges, you will still save money by having Euros or Canadian dollars to exchange for CUCs in Cuba. Plan ahead, because it will take your bank a few days to get you foreign cash.
For more information about Cuban currencies, click here.
When Christopher Columbus arrived in Cuba in 1492, he claimed the island for Spain and brought native “Indians” back with him as slaves. Decades later, Spain began sending slaves from Africa to Cuba in an effort to establish the nation as a global producer of sugar cane, which it remained for centuries.
A couple of residents stand framed by a window of their house next to an image of the late Cuban leader Fidel Castro and a Cuban Flag in Havana, Cuba. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
Slavery was abolished in Cuba in 1886, but it wasn’t until the U.S. intervened in the second war of independence that Spain officially gave up all claims to the island. Although Cuba was technically free at that point, the U.S. remained largely involved in the nation’s affairs as a result of the Platt Amendment.
Throughout the early 20th century, Cuba was led by a variety of brutal dictators, most notably Sergeant Fulgencio Batista whose regime was backed by the U.S. government. After years of fighting, Cuban revolutionaries led by Fidel Castro overthrew the Batista regime in 1959. After that, Cuba and the U.S. ended all diplomatic relations. In 1961, Castro proclaimed Cuba as a communist state.
Cuba has made tremendous strides since the days of the Batista regime when extreme poverty and illiteracy were rampant. Today, all Cubans are guaranteed education and healthcare under the government, in addition to a monthly salary.
Still, many families struggle to make ends meet and have a tough time getting some of the everyday items we tend to take for granted here in America.
When packing for your trip to Cuba, consider bringing some of these items to give to locals you stay with or people you befriend throughout your travels:
Toys, sports equipment
Ballpoint pens, notepads and other school supplies
Aspirin, ibuprofen
Vitamins (for kids and adults)
AA batteries
Old cellphones (that SIM cards can be taken out of)
USB sticks
Spanish/English dictionaries
Reading glasses
Sponges, gardening gloves
Kids toothbrushes, toothpaste
Feminine hygiene products
Hair scrunchies
Bed sheets, towels
Fishing lines, hooks
HEADS UP! If you’re flying into Havana on Southwest Airlines, you will arrive and depart via Terminal 2. Make sure you let your taxi driver know this before they drop you off at the airport. Southwest is not in the main international terminal.
