This morning we got up early, had breakfast, and climbed into our bus for our long ride to Havana’s Jose Marti International Airport, Terminal 2. We arrived in plenty of time to check-in and go through customs. As usual, I asked to have my passport stamped on the way out, and as usual, the nice agent asked me if I was sure I wanted her to do that. I assured her that it was okay, so she managed to find a clean space on my passport and banged her stamper down with what seemed to be an especially loud thud, then looked up and smiled. Perhaps she thought I was really brave for challenging my country’s laws. In reality, it was much simpler than that. Since all of us were traveling legally, why in the world would we NOT have our passports stamped? As I’ve written many times, I consider my stamp to be a badge of honor.

It was hard to believe that our expedition would soon be over. We boarded our American Airlines 737 and flew north across the Straits of Florida, landing 50 minutes and 50 years later in Miami. Customs was generally uneventful. Rather than clearing customs as a group, we were funneled into the huge open area with international flyers who just returned from all over the world. (The person immediately in front of me just returned from London.) After exiting, I picked up my checked bag and called my friends in Miami. I met them in Cuba several years ago, and I brought back some personal items that their father had given me. They picked me up at the airport and we drove to a nearby coffee shop. We had snacks, and I gave them their gifts from Cuba. They brought me back to the airport, where I boarded my flight that would take me to Atlanta (where I am finishing this chapter of my newsletter). Soon I will be heading for SFO, and another Cuban expedition will be complete. This trip has been the best yet. My fellow travelers were friendly, intelligent, and curious. It was truly an honor to help them understand more about such a tragic country with such a humane civilian society.

This has been a wonderful, relaxing Sunday. There were scattered puffy clouds in a sunny blue sky, and light breezes. The high temperature was 78 degrees (with a wind chill factor of 77). After breakfast, we gathered up our bags with medical supplies and added extra items that we brought along, such as pencils and paper pads. This would be our final donation on this expedition, so I encouraged our travelers to include any items they didn’t want to take back.

At about 10:30am we arrived at the Varadero Polyclinic Hospital, which is located right on the beach next to the Red Cross outdoor training area. I’ve brought other groups here before, and we were always welcome. We were greeted by a male nurse named Lisandes. He told me that Enrique, a nurse I met on my past two visits, was currently on a 2-year assignment working in Dubai. Lisandes introduced us to the other nurses, doctors, technicians, and the ambulance driver. The small hospital serves two other towns in the area. The hospital can receive trauma victims, and there is even a small ICU, which we briefly observed. More complicated patients and those needing specialized attention are transferred to the larger regional hospital in Mantanzas.

We were given a brief tour of the hospital, and we were able to spend some time asking questions. After that, the Cuban staff wanted to know more about us. We told them we were interested in health care in Cuba, and some of our group are nurses. Most of us are from California, but two are from Massachusetts. We donated our packs and bags of medical supplies, and the staff thanked us and wished us well. Then we boarded our bus to leave. As we were pulling away, some nurses and physicians came outside and waved us goodbye.

We returned to our hotel and everybody appreciated free time to relax, go swimming in the turquoise-green ocean, or just reflect on our expedition. I recall that one of the criticisms of some American travel groups by the U.S. Department of Treasury was that Americans were NOT supposed to come to Cuba “to just have fun and lie on the beach at Varadero.” That’s a valid point—there must be a reason or theme to visit Cuba. Of course it is expected that American visitors will stay in hotels while learning more about this country during the people-to-people programs. The travelers in my group had no choice but to stay at the hotels I chose, and one hotel just happened to be at the beach. As for the requirement that we shouldn’t have too much fun—I’m not sure we were totally compliant. We tried to stifle ourselves as best we could, but it was impossible. We’ve learned a lot, and we absolutely fostered people-to-people understanding between Cubans and Americans, as our government encourages us to do.

As I watch CNN on my hotel room television, I understand that President Obama is visiting Myanmar (formerly known as Burma), which has been a hard-core anti-American country for many decades. To me, this indicates that he wants to try to bridge the gap between any countries wanting to improve relations. Maybe Cuba will be next. My opinion is definitely in the minority, but I just feel that trying to improve relations between our countries really doesn’t have much of a downside for President Obama. A relatively small minority of radical Cuban-Americans in south Florida would be upset, but none of them voted for him anyway. Perhaps Bill and Hillary Clinton could be sent to Havana as special emissaries, bringing along Cuba’s national heroes—the five anti-terrorist specialists (“spies,” according to the radical exiles). They could be exchanged for Alan Gross, the American contractor imprisoned in Cuba for several years. (I just noticed a news article that says Gross is now suing—from his prison cell in Havana–the contracting company that sent him to Cuba, and the U.S. Government for $60 million dollars. This seems a little odd, and could certainly be related to a future prisoner exchange.)

Bill and Hillary could drink some mojitos at a formal state dinner celebrating the normalization of relations, then stroll arm and arm along the seafront malecón. It would be quite a spectacle—Americans and Cubans in both countries would break into celebrations, and the older anti-normalization Cubans in Miami would just have to get over it.

As I said, this is a possibility, but I am in a small minority of Cuba-watchers who think this could happen soon. But if it does happen, Cuba is going to have to figure out how to deal with an incredible increase in demand from Americans to visit. One thing for sure is that the prices of hotels and tour activities are going to skyrocket.

I’m getting ready to leave to go to the steak house at our hotel. Our reservations are for 9:15pm. Today is the birthday of one of our expedition members. We have 17 seats reserved—seats for 14 travelers, another one for me, one for our Cuba guide, and one for our driver. Just a few years ago, they wouldn’t have even been allowed to mingle with us at the hotel and enjoy dinner together. They have contributed so much to our expedition, and our people-to-people interactions with them have been very enjoyable.

Tomorrow we head west on a two and a half hour drive to Havana International Airport. At 1:30pm we are scheduled to leave the Twilight Zone that is Cuba for the Reality that is the U.S. In some ways, it will be as much of a shock to our travelers as it was to arrive in Havana ten days ago.

This is one of my favorite places in Cuba, but I have received a lot of criticism for bringing groups here. Many knowledgeable Cuba fanatics feel this isn’t the “Real Cuba.” Is South Beach the “Real Florida?” Is the Kona Coast the “Real Hawaii?” I understand why I’m being criticized, and I to a certain degree I agree with what I think they are trying to say. If travelers want to come to this beautiful island, travel inland, and sleep with the local camposinos in the cane fields, that’s their right.

The goal of the expedition I designed is to enhance the people-to-people philosophy encouraged by the U.S. Government. I’ve considered what I would want my family or good friends to see and experience while on a first-time visit to Cuba. Keeping in mind the theme of health care in Cuba, I’m providing a variety of activities and visits that I hope present an accurate view of the people, culture, and geography of this island. We’ve seen a variety of places—from the capitol city of Havana to a mountainous national park, from small villages in the countryside to a seaside resort. And we’ve done this without making extensive journeys, stopping at different hotels every other night. There is a great variety of tours and trips to Cuba, especially now that the Department of Treasury has caught-up with the license renewal process. I hope my readers will investigate other programs relating to Cuba and find one they feel comfortable with. You can get started by clicking on “Other Tours” on my website.

Varadero is very important to understanding Cuba. After the U.S. took over control of Cuba from Spain in 1898, many wealthy Americans flocked to the beaches here. Al Capone built a seaside home, and used it as a headquarters to smuggle rum into the U.S. during Prohibition. (Too bad we can’t learn from the past. Many Americans understand that outlawing items wanted by large numbers of people always results in corruption, increased danger to society, and very wealthy, powerful criminals. Just ask the people of today’s Mexico how America’s War on Drugs is working out for them.)

From the 1920’s onward to the Cuban revolution, Varadero was considered to be one of the top beach resort areas in the world. Many Americans built vacation homes here, sailing or flying across the Florida Straits, sometimes just for the weekend. By the 1950’s Varadero had a casino and it became a favorite hangout for Hollywood stars and mobsters. After the revolution, tourism was de-emphasized, but in the 1990’s, after the Soviet Union vaporized and the Russians stopped supporting the economy, Cuba began a crash program to bring hard currency from tourists back to the island as a matter of economic and political survival.

Varadero today represents the single largest source of money for the Government. (Some people believe that even more money is brought and sent by relatives in Florida—possibly up to two billion USD annually—but that money is given directly to individuals. It circulates in the economy and makes its way to the government eventually.) Varadero has its own international airport. Because of the tourist industry here, the surrounding communities have a noticeable higher standard of living than in the rest of Cuba overall. I believe that tourist centers like Varadero, along with the Black Market, that help educate Cubans in market economics, supply-and-demand, etc. They are more than ready to embrace a “socialist” system like China’s: work hard, pay taxes, don’t criticize the government too much, and it will leave them alone. I believe Cuba would thrive under such a system, as individual effort would be rewarded rather than punished, and the government would hopefully become increasingly irrelevant. When that happens, perhaps they can send advisers to the U.S. to teach us how to fix our slumping economy. It’s slightly amusing to fantasize about a future where desperate Americans climb onto inner tubes and rafts, and launch themselves into the ocean off Miami Beach. They would paddle south towards Havana, with the hope of finding a job in a more vibrant economy! The Castros won’t live forever, and the young are VERY restless; most are totally fed-up with the current system.

Okay-okay—enough propaganda and indoctrination. Today we rode over to see Al Capone’s home, now known as Casa de Al Restaurant. We had coffee and drinks on his beachside patio, and tried to envision what it must have been like in the 1930’s with millions of dollars being pumped into the nearby community and its marina.

We stopped at a Western Union office so that two of our travelers could pick up extra money sent from California. The others visited nearby shops and walked around this beach town. We also spent time at the Du Pont Mansion, built in 1926 by American industrialist Irenee Du Pont. An adjacent guest house was converted by the Castro government—not converted to housing for the poor–but converted into the Clubhouse for the spectacular Varadero Country Club. The golf course follows the middle of this narrow peninsula for several miles, with views of Cardenas Bay to the south, and the Straits of Florida to the north. (This was yet another opportunity to remind ourselves that we were visiting a “communist” country.)

We rode out to the far end of the peninsula, where numerous cranes signaled hotel construction projects by companies from Spain, Canada, Brazil, and China. A third marina is also under construction. Of course American companies should have had their share of these multi-billion dollar projects, but the U.S. embargo just keeps getting in the way. I keep reminding myself that the goal of the embargo was to collapse the Cuban economy, and to drive the Castros from power. They’ve remained in control for over 50 years, so perhaps we shouldn’t rush to judgment. I’m fairly certain they will not be in power 50 years from now, so that will obviously prove the logic of the embargo. Then the State Department, the C.I.A., and the radical exiles in Miami will be able to “save face” and claim a victory in this battle of ideas.

The rest of today we just took it easy and met informally in discussion groups at the bar and on the beach. Overall our travelers seem really happy with their experiences so far. They continue to praise the services of our Cuban guide, who is very knowledgeable and speaks excellent English. (He is also fluent in French, Italian, and of course, Spanish.)

Tomorrow we will visit the local hospital, tour the facility, talk with the staff, and make our medical donations. We’re looking forward to this visit.