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Took a Via train in from London and then from Union took a Go Train one stop back to Exhibition Place. Plan was to meet my youngest daughter Annie and then Dhan later in the afternoon. As usual I took some pics to catch the atmosphere of the place in 2024.

Our initial plans for the day was to check out the beach close to the resort. Which we did shortly after Dhan had a fresh coconut, and some breakfast for the both of us.

Dhan went to check out the beach and look for any pieces of coral, and I looked to find a pair of available lounge seats under a cabana. I found one with a pair of unoccupied lounge seats that were closed and had the resort’s towel on it. So we proceeded to lie down for a bit and enjoy the view, the sun, and the azure blue of the Atlantic Ocean.

Maybe 20 minutes into things we were both rudely interrupted by another resident of the resort claiming that the spot was and that the generic resort towel was his. He was a real ass about it, and I gave him back the spot exactly as I had found it. He was beginning to be apologetic at the end but he pissed me off so much that it ruined any possible enjoyment we could have had by moving on to a different part of the beach. That was the only real sour experience we had at Cayo Coco the entire trip, and it figures it was from a fellow Canuck being an ass. Worth pointing out that the cabanas by the poolside have a notice on them saying that they cannot be reserved, and most sensible people will leave a personal object (a book, a distinctive towel, or a water bottle) to claim a set of lounge chairs, and this asshat and done nothing like that. I didn’t want to fight over such a small thing, but the experience left a bad taste in my mouth, ditto for Dhan.

We retired to our room to recollect ourselves, and I pitched the idea about heading over to a place nearby called La Gaviota, which was a Commercial Center for selling souvenir crafts and other items. So we headed to the resort lobby to hire a cab to get there. We were lucky in that there were already a couple of cabs waiting there, both beautiful vintage cars from long before the U.S. embargo that started in the late 1950s.

The trip alone was well worth it, as the short drive to La Gaviota in the open-topped late 50s Buick was a blast. The first time either of us had ever traveled anywhere in such a vintage vehicle.

Turns out La Gaviota means “Seagull” in Spanish, and that is exactly what the building looks like from the outside.

The market at La Gaviota had a lot of variety, ranging from jewelry to t-shirts, and locally-made crafts of all sorts. Some official stores sold beach towels, rum, beer, and of course cigars. Dhan picked up a wooden blue crab and I picked up a set of fridge magnets of the iconic Che Guevara for friends and family back home.

Pleased with our purchases for ourselves and for the people back home, we made our way via the grand old Buick back to our resort.

And from there, we retired back to our room for a welcome afternoon nap.

It was close to sunset when we woke up, and we decided to stroll by the beach before dinner.

We had dinner and then retired to the lounge area for some music and drink. And my first-ever game of dominos with Dhan.

Both of us slept very well that first night, thoroughly exhausted from the travel the day before. We got up in the morning to head to the main restaurant for our first breakfast.

Here’s the view from our front balcony:

We lucked out that first morning, as we found the groundskeepers who made the rounds clearing up ripe coconuts before they could fall from the trees. Our neighbour already had a deal where one of the groundskeepers brought her fresh coconut hacked right from the coconut. Dhan got in on this deal pronto and had her first of what would be many mornings of fresh coconut water.

We then settled in for our first buffet breakfast at the resort and tucked in:

After breakfast, we headed to the open-air lobby where we met with an Air Canada representative who went over the available daily excursion packages. We chose the trip that would take us to the local small cities of Moron and Ciego de Ávila along with some other stops the following Monday. During our chat, a local male Carib grackle sang sweetly on top of an adjacent table:

We then went for a quick stroll through the grounds of a resort.

The resort had lots of bougainvillea bushes in shades of red, white and purple. A cheery sight after months of drab winter colours back home.

We ended up sleeping a lot that first, catching up on lost sleep from the days before. We had our dinner back at the buffet in the evening, and then hung out in the open-air foyer where we had drinks, checked emails, and enjoyed a singer playing standards.

We then checked out the nightly show at the nearby theater, which was a Michael Jackson-themed dance and music show. Lots of fun! Afterwards, Dhan got in a couple of pics with the performers.

And afterward, we retired back to our room for another restful night.

Looking for a nice warm place to relax in the Caribbean, I found a package deal from Air Canada for a week at an all-inclusive resort in Cayo Caco in Cuba. Never have been to Cuba before, the price was certainly good, and after researching some YouTube videos about the resort in question, we decided to go for it.

It started snowing heavily when we arrived in Toronto. Perfect weather to start a flight to somewhere nice and warm.

This is what it looked like as we were heading down the ramp at Pearson to our Air Canada Rouge flight:

From my time traveling on business on Air Canada Rouge flights, I got us seats with extra leg-room by the second set of emergency exit doors. Well worth it in terms of leg comfort, though there’s still not much in the way of elbow room either. Also no window to speak of, so no pics of the take-off or landing.

We arrived at the Cayo Coco/Jardines del Rey Airport (which goes by CCC) late that same evening.

It was nice being in the open air shortly after landing, and we exited from the back of the plane, and got into the long line up for Cuban customs, along with the passengers from two other flights from different Canadian airlines that arrived at around the same time.

It took a while to make our way through customs, and they didn’t seem to recognize us as a couple, so we each went to the customs agent one at a time. It was also a very long (almost an hour-and-a-half) wait for our checked luggage to arrive, and with three airplane’s worth of passengers and next to no seats in the baggage waiting area around, it seemed to take even longer. But in the end our luggage appeared, and we made our way to the bus that would take us to our resort.

It was there we met Alex, who got everyone on the bus and gave us a quick and friendly lowdown on how to best enjoy our vacations at the resorts. He had a lively trade in selling cold beer to the passengers.

Our resort was the final stop that the bus made, so we briefly got to see the foyers of a couple of other resorts. Our plane left a bit late and we waited forever for our luggage, so there was no welcoming party for us at the hotel, but we were beat by that point and were very thankful to get on an extended golf-cart which took us to our room. It was one of the “regular” rooms, which was sizable, had a king-sized bed, small TV, bar fridge, and a nice bathroom.

After shucking off our Canadian clothes and getting into something more appropriate for the warmer weather, we headed to the “snack bar” (actually a full restaurant and bar) and got a bite to eat. That is where we met the first of the local cats who hang out at the resort.

After that, we retired gratefully to bed.

My daughter Annie told me about this place and thought I would like it, so I decided to go for a visit.

This store is something of a local London, ON legend, and was supposedly the type of store Stuart McLean had in mind for his Vinyl Cafe stories.

Lots of fun, and I managed to come away with a few records and CDs. Will definitely be making a return trip or two here.

A somewhat battered-looking female Black Swallowtail spent a long time fluttering around the butterfly bush in our front yard. Took many pics during her visit.