ProBar in Cuba

ProBar Fuels Cuba Cycling Trip
www.theprobar.com

Well Fed Man would like to extend a high-five to the peeps over at ProBar for their support of a recent self-supported bicycling trip around the affable island nation of Cuba. Heat, ridiculously steep ascents and, at times, few palatable food options meant that the 50 some bars we stuffed in the panniers came in very handy.

The 54-day, 3000-kilometre trip started in the magnificent city of Havana and moved south to Trinidad. A quaint World Heritage town adorned with cobblestone streets – not particularly great for a cyclist, but charming none the less.

From Trinidad a bus was hailed (yep, it’s cheating) east to Holguin to begin the cycling adventure around an area of Cuba known as The Oriente. This was a spectacular two weeks of pedaling that included coastal roads that left Well Fed Man agape, a New Year’s Eve pig roast with a large local family in La Mula, the infamous La Farola climb before the hair-raising descent into the charming seaside town of Baracoa, exceptionally friendly locales, sunburn at the white sand beach of Playa Magauna and plenty of ProBar’s filling the tummy and fueling the legs.

After 5-days and 500 plus kilometres of flat riding through Cuba’s central plains we made our way east of Havana into the Pinar Del Rio province. Saturated with verdant landscape, small villages, lots of ups and downs and magotes – huge rock formations that rise abruptly from the ground – the eastern reaches of Cuba is very much a cyclists’ paradise. But best of all, and the norm is most of the country, the roads are virtually car-free with horse carts outnumbering 4-wheeled machines several fold.