Lee’s Cuba Bike Tour Newsletter Summer 2022 Happy Summer Everyone! People often ask me what the weather is like in Cuba during the winter – it’s pretty similar to our Canadian summers. In Cuba, November to April are the dry months, with average daytime highs around 25-28 Celsius and lows around 19-20 Celsius. The ocean is warm for swimming at 25-30 Celsius. All together, perfect for cycling, swimming, and sightseeing. And yes Cuba is a safe travel destination, made better by the support of Bicycle Breeze who support you from arrival to departure with a team including your tour leader, a Cuban cultural tour guide, bike mechanic, bus driver, and a support team in Havana. Information provided before you depart and daily briefings during the tour will keep you informed of what to expect, and support you with practical advice to make your tour a success. In this newsletter first I want to remind you to check that your passport expiry date has not passed. With travel challenges, m...

  Cuba Bike Tour Newsletter - Spring 2022   Thank you to everyone who reached out to wish me well and help out as I recovered from eye surgery this winter. The result has been very good, so good in fact that we are leaving for Mallorca Spain this week to enjoy Spring cycling carrying over from our winter cycling fitness and some indoor spinning.   As promised in the Winter Newsletter, we have completed the full-length version of our Fat Mary / Maria la Gorda 2022 tour video. A link is provided below along with a summary of the planned repeat of this tour in January 2023. We hope the video leaves you excited to try a bike tour in Cuba yourself. Fat Mary Tour 2022 – The Video Get a bag of popcorn and a beverage and check out this video. We screened it on the weekend with the tour riders and they were very pumped to re-live their 15-day adventure. Here is the video -- > Fat Mary Tour 2022 Full HD   Western Cuba Tour – “Fat Mary / María la Gorda”...

Cuba Bike Tour Blog & 2023 Tour Plans - Winter 2023 Beth and I have been fortunate to get out and travel – it’s not as easy as it used to be but it sure is worth the effort. This blog shares some information on our recently concluded Fat Mary Bike T our in Cuba, and announces our three upcoming tours for 2023 . Fat Mary Tour 2022 – The Story We spent early January 2022, in Varadero Cuba getting back in shape after a few months off the bike, getting tanned, and losing some winter weight. It was all going well until I noticed that my eyesight was getting worse, I was seeing birds flying across my vision at the speed of a UFO, and one day at lunch I realized I could not see in the lower quarter of my right eye. We traveled to Havana and with support from Peter and Ana at Bicycle Breeze I went to a retinal specialist at the world-famous Instituto de Oftalmología Ramon Pando Ferrer (Cuban Institute of Ophthalmology). They confirmed my fear that I had a partial retinal tear. ...

Celia Sánchez Cuba Bike Tour Beth and I have done this tour twice before - first in 2010 and again in 2015. The route covers my favourite part of Cuba with its quiet rural roads and spectacular scenery and vistas as we circle the Sierra Maestra mountain range.  Cleverly, we cycle around the mountains along the edge, so there are no really big climbs.  We take advantage of the tour bus and jeeps to explore the highest mountain range in Cuba. We are returning in February 2024 to lead another tour group - see the link at the bottom of the blog for details on how to join us. Starting in the City of Holguin, we make a clockwise loop around the mountains ending 15 days later in Guardalavaca. Celia Sánchez Bike Tour Route This tour is named after Celia Sánchez, the heroine of the Cuban revolution.  Celia grew up in the Sierra Maestra and worked alongside her father at his medical practice in Pilon. She became involved in planning the revolution working alongside a well-organized...

Cuban roads are variable, from smooth as a dream asphalt in many cases, to worn/aged asphalt, and sometimes down to pot holes and gravel (kinda like where I live in Canada with all the winter frost).   Riding in Cuba is far nicer than North America with its busy roads and drivers rushing around oblivious to the experience of riding a bike.   Most Cubans spend a lot of time getting around on foot, or cycling to work and have empathy developed by that shared experience.   People often ask me if it’s safe to cycle in Cuba – to which I unreservedly say it’s the safest place to ride bike that I’ve been.  I would put Mallorca Spain a close second but that’s a different type of vacation with its $5 cups of coffee. In Cuba, you will want to be prepared for cars to pass you with a little toot from the horn.   They do this as a courtesy so you know they are passing. In small towns, bikes may be a large percentage of the traffic.   Expect to see cyclists weaving a...