Day 3 La Moka, Las Terazas

Hello,
Las Terrazas (the terraces) is a reforestation project in the hills an hour west of Havana. It was originally stripped of its timber then further cleared for coffee plantations. The soils washed away and the coffee growing moved out. About 40 years ago it was made a reserve and replanted - its a decent size. The forest got a smashing in the 2008 huricanes but is still well vegetated and atractive hill country, with a river. La Moka is a good hotel, best rooms yet.

The 'terraces' refers to the fact that a colossal undertaking was made by Castro, post revolution (1959)to bulldoze this formidible sized area of hill country into 10m wide terraces, so that flat surfaces for the initial plantings would not wash out in the torrentail rains. Thats communism for you - bring out the tractors. I photographed a picture of parts of the area to show you what they did. Dad might pick up a few tips for bulldozing Colinswood as part of the recovery process?

So the place is not quite the nature reserve we expected, but we are warming to it. There is a resident cuban village below the hotel and they all work on the forest project, running the hotel, guiding and forest maintenance.
We had a guide to show us round today. It started (yikes) with a rum and musicians playing, then we were driven high on the property to an old coffee ranch, abandoned but now restored. It was a slave driven business and the ruins include relics of those times. We were wondering why the native americam facial features (think hispanic) are not as prevelent in Cuba as first thought - apparently the spanish endevoured to eradicate them from cuba as they bought negro slaves in. So the people are very hispanic with degrees of negro influence although we think we notice a degree of separation between the two races.
The bird life was good on the hill top at last more humming birds. They will be impossible to photograph except at feeders they are as active as any insect.
We then visited an elderly woman (Maria) who had grown up as a girl at the end of the coffee production era and now lives beside a coffee shop bearing here name. What a fascinating looking woman - only 69 but apparently not in good health and looks much older - a very hard life said our guide. I asked to photograph her and she said yes. We had another memorable coffee in her cafe, then moved on to see some swimming holes in the river. There were busloads of Havanans pouring in, it is a popular weekend picnic area. The clear waters have fish in them not to mention loads of jumping splashing brown bodies, and gas cookers dotted everywhere as families cooked up lunch. Bit of a food day because next we went to a local farm, in the bush, for lunch. We sat outside under a thatched cover and three men sang for a while. Two were old fellers, one of them blind. One played the guitar, simply but sweetly, and the other two shared singing with great gusto, arm draped on the others shoulder. There were chickens, peafowl and guinea fowl everywhere, chased out occassionally by a small dog. The food was typical - some orange slices to start with, then bread and butter, then some greens, rice with black beans, and slices of port and bits of chicken. A small bit of icecream and coffee to finish with. We were driven home with thye intention of walking to chase some of birds we had glimpsed, but a bath and lie down got the better of us so thats for tomorrow.

The evening was a bit of a treat. We had dinner on the balcony and the local woodpecker population was out and about. Wonderful to watch such an unfamiliar and colourful bird at close quaters, and to enjoy the sound of their hammering throughout dinner! I have some good photos. Around the balcony are mostly teak trees, with surprisingly large leaves (for a hardwood, or so we thought). They are at least 35 cm long and not unlike an outsized poplar leaf. Then we had a rain shower - our first rain since here. It drummed on the leaves, building into a wall of sound and the smell of wet ground was almost immediate. Fingers crossed for more tonight it would be a good sound to sleep to and decent competion for the shot air con unit and spastic ceiling fan. Surprising how quickly you miss rain when you dont have it, and i remembered for a moment the sound of a southerly blast rattling the roof at home.

The mosquito bites are accumulating, Shanti in particular is sporting a few. She is not here to disagree, so I can comment on her habit of not wearing much cover, while refusing to consider that might have any bearing on the bite rate.

Rose will be pleased that as per her instructions we are swithching off the alarm for one morning and will get up tomorrow when we get up. We are devoting the day to tracking down more bird life so its binocs, camera and walking tracks coming up.

sxx