The Committee On Illinois, DBA

Architectural CUBA Tour 04 – 11 January 2014 People to People Educational Exchange The Committee on Illinois

Departure: Miami Hotel: – Hotel NACIONAL

Day 1 – JAN 04 2014 - SATURDAY

Depart for Havana from Miami (NOTE: times will be confirmed the month prior to departure)

Estimated check in: 5:00 AM EST - Concourse G – 2nd Floor

Estimated Departure: 9:00 AM

Estimated Havana Arrival: 10:00 AM

The city of Havana (La Habana) was first settled 25 November 1519 on the sheltered, natural Havana Bay and became Cuba’s capital city in 1553. It proved a strategic and thereby wealthy jumping off spot for New World gold and silver being transported to Spain.

Bus Transfer to Havana via Revolution Square - Visit Marti Museum and Tower

Visit the Plaza de la Revolucion – This large square is surrounded by many of the major state offices and the impressive Jose Marti Memorial Museum Tower, the highest point in the city. This large square is the center of the city for political rallies and special events including the open air masses held during the two Papal visits.

Transfer to Hotel Nacional for Check-in

Group lunch –Hotel Nacional –La Baracca Garden Restaurant

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 1 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

The Hotel Nacional de Cuba was opened on December 30, 1930. In 1992 it went through a general restoration preserving the beautiful details and all the splendor of its eclectic architecture, a result of a mixture of features with modern influences of that time. Situated in the middle of , the center of Havana, it stands on a hill just a few meters from the Florida Straits of the Atlantic Ocean, and its garden offers a great view of the , the El Malecon seawall and the city. The Hotel stands out due to its refined elegance which since 1930 has attracted a large number of world famous leaders and personalities. The site of a famous mob summit in 1946, Meyer Lanskey went on to open a Casino and Nightclub at the Hotel Nacional in 1955 that matched the biggest Las Vegas casinos in revenues until closed by in 1960. Royal Palms line the entrance to the hotel.

The Malecon is the nearly 5 mile seawall with 6 traffic lanes and a broad oceanfront walkway running from west from Castillo de San Salvador de la Punta to the River Almendares. The Malecon is a very popular gathering spot for all Habaneros.

Vedado once referred to the “forbidden” area outside the historic city’s walls that banned construction and retained its forest preserve as a buffer against attack. This residential neighborhood area is currently the commercial heart of modern Havana.

6:15 PM - Transfer across Havana Bay past the Castillo de Los Tres Reyes del Morro

Castillo de Los Tres Reyes del Morro was built between 1589 and 1630 at the entrance to Havana harbor on the peninsula point opposite the city buildings of Havana. Down along the water is the Battery of the 12 Apostles with each canon named after an apostle.

6:30 PM - Group dinner at La Divina Pastora

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8:15 PM – Transfer to the Fortaleza de San Carlos de la Cabana

Fortaleza de San Carlos de la Cabana was built between 1763 and 1774 on the la Cabana hillside down from El Castillo del Morro after the English conquest of the city from that hill area. Steep walls, a deep moat and a majestic drawbridge make this long hillside fortress (it once housed 120 canon) a dominant feature on the harbor and a great spot for viewing at night. It also housed political prisoners and became ’s headquarters after taking possession of the city in 1959.

9:00 PM - Canonazo Ceremony

Every night the picturesque Canonazo Ceremony takes place with an historical ceremony recalling the firing of a canon shot to announce the closing of the city gates and the raising of a chain in the harbor to protect against pirate attacks. A drummer marches soldiers dressed in 18th century Spanish Colonial uniforms to the ramparts at 8:45 AM to prepare the large canon for its loud explosion at 9:00 PM.

Day 2 - JAN 05 – SUNDAY

Walking Tour Old Havana – 4 Squares - Meet with representatives of the Historian’s Office to discuss renovation efforts in Old Havana

Havana Vieja or Old Havana is the historic center of Havana with Spanish colonial buildings surrounded by a city wall in Havana’s early years. Currently in restoration, the area was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1982.

The area incorporates four main squares: Plaza de Armas, Plaza Vieja, and Plaza de San Francisco. The busy Calle Mercaderes and the bustling Calle Obispo are Old Havana’s major crossing streets. Calle Obispo starts to the west of the Plaza de Armas and is a main shopping street in Old Havana. It runs past the Ambos Mundos Hotel up to the El Bar, birthplace of the daiquiri, and the Parque Central where you’ll find the Capitolio and the Grand Theater.

The Plaza de Armas is Havana’s oldest square. The center area, often bordered by bookstalls, has a statue of

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revolutionary landowner Carlos Manuel de Cespedes at its center. At the northeast corner is the neo-classical (built in 1828) marking the spot where the first mass in Havana was said under a Ceiba tree in 1519. This event is celebrated again every 16 November.

Opposite is the Castillo de la Real Fuerza, Cuba’s oldest building and the second oldest fort in the New World. This fort and a city wall were built to protect the inhabitants from pirates. The weathervane atop the fort is La Giraldilla, the symbol of Havana representing governor Hernando de Soto’s wife who watched in vain for his return from his Florida campaign. On the west side of the square is the Palacio de los Capitanes Generales (1780), the home of Cuba’s ruling governor and now the city’s historical museum.

Group Lunch –El Templete Restaurant on the waterfront

Plaza de Catedral is a beautiful square surrounded by noble residences and anchored by the Cathedral of Saint Christopher, Havana’s patron saint. Construction of a church on the site began in the 18th century and was built into La Catedral de San Cristobal de la Habana after the Jesuits were expelled in 1767. This undulating baroque structure, (“music set in stone”), featuring asymmetrical towers was completed in 1777.

La Plaza Vieja is the largest of the four Old Havana squares and is dominated by 18th century residential buildings. The square that once was a covered market and later hosted fiestas, bullfights and executions is now becoming more tourist minded with small museums, galleries and restaurants including a brewery.

Meet with students and professors at the Escuela Gaspar Melchor e Jovellanos and Escuela Carlos Mariategui Vocational Restoration Schools . View the Havana Harbor Restoration as commercial traffic will soon be routed to Mariel Harbor

Dinner on Own Attend Ballet Performance on own

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 4 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

Day 3 – JAN 6 - MONDAY

Visit Instituto Superior de Arte

Discuss with professors and students the architectural styles in Cuba

Lunch at El Aljibe - This very popular outdoor restaurant in Miramar is a favorite with Cubans and foreign visitors alike and is known for its unique chicken dinner specialty.

Tour FUSTER Studio and Community Art Project Located in Jaimanitas, here you’ll have an opportunity to discuss with artists and neighbors how the studio has transformed their entire neighborhood into a work of art and a model of private entrepreneurial initiative.

Tour the working Bocoy Factory

Visit Cementerio Colon Known internationally as a sculpture garden of mausoleums and tombs, Cementerio Colón, Havana, is one of the great historical cemeteries of the world, and is generally held to be the second most important in Latin America—in historical and architectural terms—after La Recoleta in Buenos Aires.

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 5 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

Visit the The Universidad de La Habana was founded by Dominican friars in 1728, and the current site has a dramatic steep staircase at its entrance with its signature Alma Mater statue of a seated woman with outstretched arms. The staircase was often the scene of student protests during the Machado and Batista dictatorships.

Dinner on own at private Paladar

Day 4 – JAN 7 – TUESDAY

Tour architectural sites in Central Havana and Vedado

Visit the Bacardi Building The Bacardi Building is one of Havana’s principal landmarks, standing on the western edge of the city’s historical center. Its architect, Esteban Rodríguez Castells, originally won the international competition for its construction with a neo- Renaissance proposal, but after visiting the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris he completely reworked his design as an extravaganza of Ard Deco style.

The building, which is twelve stories high and has more than a passing resemplance to a Babylonian ziggurat, was completed in 1930 by an international team headed by Esteban Rodríguez with his project aswsociates, architect Rafael Fernández and engineer José Menéndez.

Tour Cigar Factory The Fábrica de Tabaco Partagas was founded in 1845 and is Cuba's largest and perhaps most renowned cigar factory, producing around 5 million cigars a year. The off-yellow-and-rust

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 6 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

trimmed, neoclassical facade, located behind the Capitolio, is currently under renovation. At the current fabrica, you will meet and see how skilled workers prepare and select the tobacco and then roll and sort the many cigar brands produced here.

Group lunch on own in a restaurant in China Town Chinese immigrants arrived in the mid-late 1800s and eventually established a community of more than 40,000 Chinese in Cuba. Havana’s “El Barrio Chino” grew to 44 square blocks and was once the largest such community in Latin America. In addition to working in the fields, they opened shops, restaurants, and laundries and worked in factories. A unique fusion Chinese-Cuban cuisine melding Caribbean and Chinese flavors also emerged.

Residents developed community organizations and social clubs, such as the Casino Chung Wah, founded in 1893. This community association continues to assist the Chinese in Cuba today with education and cultural programs. The Chinese-language weekly, Kwong Wah Po also still publishes in Havana.

View Miramar architectural sites Again today we’ll travel with Cuban guests to discuss post WW II Cuban architecture.

Examples of places we’ll visit today include the Tropicana – a world-known cabaret and club launched in 1939 at Villa Mina, a six-acre suburban estate with lush tropical gardens in Havana's neighborhood – and the Richard Neutra House.

Originally known as the Alfred de Schulthess House, built in 1956 in Cubanacan Playa, is 9350 sq ft on a three-acre property. Raul Alvarez worked as supervising architect; Benno Fischer, Serge Koschin, John Blanton all worked on the architectural design; the noted Brazilian landscape architect, Roberto Burle Marx, collaborated on the landscape design. Now a diplomatic residence for Switzerland, it received the 1958 National College of Architects Gold Medal.

Dinner on own

Optional Tropicana Show

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 7 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

Day 5 –JAN 8 - WEDNESDAY

Tour Hemingway’s home, Finca Vigia, in the village of San Francisco de Paula. Meet with director Ada Rosa and the museum staff

Ernest Hemingway, the Nobel and Pulitzer prize winning author, born and raised in Oak Park, IL, first visited Cuba in 1928 and returned regularly from 1932 on for fishing, to write in his habitual room at the Ambos Mundos Hotel (now a museum room at the hotel), and in 1939 purchased Finca Vigia (Lookout Farm) in San Francisco de Paula. Finca Vigia represents one of the few areas where the U.S. and Cuban governments have worked together in recent years to structurally restore the house and preserve and then digitalize the many letters and documents left there for use in academic research. Circling the ground floor, you can see the house more or less as it was when Hemingway was living and writing here. There's his library of 9,000 books, paintings, and stuffed animal heads. In addition to his old upright typewriter and his portable typewriter (the celebrated subject of recent research), the works of art by Picasso, Miró, and Klee are some of the more prized possessions. There's a small tower separate from the main house that you can climb for a better view of the countryside. In the surrounding gardens, you can see Papa's pet cemetery, the swimming pool and the author's dry-docked fishing boat, Pilar.

Visit the village of Cojimar The fishing village where author, famous deep sea fisherman, docked his boat the Pilar. It was the home of his faithful boat captain Gregorio Fuentes and the setting for his Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Old Man and the Sea.

Lunch at La Terraza de Cojimar This café/bar/restaurant in Cojimar is where fisherman in days past brought their daily catch. It was one of Hemingway’s favorite restaurants and featured in the Spencer Tracy film of The Old Man and the Sea.

Visit Museum to discuss the African slave experience in Cuba and Santeria religious practices

Guanabacoa, founded in 1607, was a major port of call for the slave traffic into the Caribbean and has retained its close association with Afro-Cuban culture. The Guanabacoa Museum illustrates the history of the city with a heavy emphasis on the Santeria religion that

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 8 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

sprung from the African religions brought to Cuba. It successfully blended orishas with Catholic saints, allowing its practitioners to worship within a Catholic country. Even today, Santeria is widely practiced on the island by all races. The museum courtyard holds traditional Afro-Cuban events and rituals throughout the year.

Dinner on own

Day 6- JAN 9 - THURSDAY

Transfer to the Sierra del Rosario Bioshpere Reserve in Pinar del Rio province tour of Tour Meet ecological researchers and tour the project gardens Coffee Plantation tour

Lunch at Casa del Campesino

Visit to Las Terrazas, a sustainable agricultural community including workshops

Visit Art Studio of Lester Campa

Tour Hotel Moka las Terrazas, a modern interpretation of Spanish Colonial architecture that blends into the forested environment

Group dinner at Hotel Moka

Transfer to Hotel Nacional for overnight

Day 7– JAN 10 - FRIDAY Visit community Farmer’s Market or tour new Commercial Store

Discuss with Cuban professors and students the new opportunities for Cubans in the country’s recent economic reforms

Visit La Pachanga – popular new hamburger restaurant in Havana and an example of new entrepreneurial spirit

Lunch on own

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 9 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

Visit the National Museum of Fine Arts – Cuban Section

Visit the Merger Art Studio to meet local artists

FAREWELL Dinner with Cuban guests at the Café del Oriente

Day 8 – JAN 11 – SATURDAY

Flight Havana to Miami (NOTE: times will be confirmed the month prior to departure)

Departure from Havana – Terminal 2, Jose Marti Airport

Estimated Check in: 8:00 AM

Estimated HAVANA departure: 11:00 AM

Estimated MIAMI arrival: 12:00 NOON

Havana-Land and Air Program Includes:

Round trip flight from Miami to Havana Miami Airport Departure Tax US Treasury Department License from The Committee on Illinois to legally travel to Cuba Cuban Visa (Note: persons born in Cuba will require additional time, paperwork and fees to process their Visa) Cuba Health Insurance for any medical expenses in Cuba Group air conditioned bus transportation for transfers and program including Round trip bus transportation – Havana / Cienfuegos / Trinidad / Havana

Committee on Illinois tour leader Bilingual group tour guide for entire stay Two bottles of water per participants daily Double Room at the Hotel Nacional per itinerary Daily Breakfasts

Educational Program Sessions per itinerary Program Gratuities Lunch at La Barraca Lunch at El Templete Lunch at El Aljibe

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 10 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U The Committee On Illinois, DBA

Lunch at Las Terrazas in Cojimar – the setting in Hemingway’s novel, The Old Man and the Sea Lunch at Casa del Campesino (Biosphere Reserve) Dinner at Hotel Moka Dinner with Cuban guests at the Café del Oriente

Not Included: Transportation to and from Miami and within Miami Lodging in Miami Single Supplement Cuban Airport Departure Tax – 25 CUC ($30) paid by travelers when leaving Havana Meals and drinks not specified in final program Taxis or individual travel within Cuba U.S. travel insurance (recommended) Individual Tips for Cuban guide and driver

Costs based on 10 person group minimum (Note: Itinerary Subject to Change – usually for the better)

LAND Package: Double Room: $2,995 per person Single Supplement: $ 300

AIR Package Round Trip AIR - Miami/Havana: $ 525 per person (Airfare confirmed month before departure)

Non-Refundable Deposit of $100 per person to reserve space

NOTE: Travel to Cuba from the U.S. is not cheap but a review of competing programs shows our combined rates to be a very good value.

Please let both Scott Schwar ([email protected]) and Lisa Greyhill ([email protected]) Committee on Illinois partners know if you are planning to participate or if you have questions.

Cuba Tours 4 U, LLC, is a DBA of The Committee On Illinois and holder of OFAC license: CT-2012-298487-1 11 725 Wisconsin Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois 604051 P/F: (708) 386-8506 │ www.cubatours4u.com │ [email protected] | FB: Cuba Tours 4 U | @CubaTours4U