La Ruta Mala
I think I have a small leak on the diesel tank under the sink in my camper van. I’m fairly certain it only happens when my 2 fresh water containers are completely full and I fill the 10L fuel tank more than 50%. I noticed it just before I started my ride today off Mt. Lemmon. I rode my Allied BC40 and as I used a digital pressure gauge to check appropriate psi, I noticed a small tear on the sidewall that could spell disaster with trails as chunky as Bug Springs and La Milagrosa. I hoped I have good enough luck to make it back to Chris’s BMW parked at the bottom of the ride.
These thoughts consume me. The potential diesel leak. The potential tire failure. One makes for a stinky night and a project for tomorrow. The other means I’ve got to do some trailside repair or take a long walk. And there it is, my darkest hour could be time at Ace Hardware in Tucson or a long walk down a beautiful canyon trail.
Neither happened.
I’m safely back in my van atop Mt. Lemmon and it’s fine. I not only made it down the trail without a tire failure but I made it down the trail in style and was hoot’n and holler’n with Chris as we enjoyed the height of the day together. His BMW greeted us as we skid to a stop and now I’m sitting here warm, fed, and in Normatec Compression Boots. Safe. Back in my van. Surrounded by luxuries. So now I’m ready to tell the story…
The story about my bikepacking trip to Cuba.
The story about how a vision deteriorated after colliding with reality.
The story about how my emotions got the better of me, and it’s not because I am weak, but because I am slightly matured.
The story about how I do not recommend traveling to Cuba as a tourist.
The story about how I so wish I could give away a sliver of my luxury to change the entire existence of a single Cuban, perhaps many.
The story about how my darkest hour could very well be a lifetime highlight for a version of me unlucky enough to be born on an island just 90 miles from the US.
Here goes.
I’d done my homework. Back in December of 2022 into January 2023 I completed the Baja Divide bikepacking route with my pal Brian and relied on his joy for mapping, researching, and setting goals for the trip. I simply swiped my credit card when necessary, ate food, pedaled, hydrated, and met everyone I could on route. Unfortunately Brian couldn’t come to Cuba so the planning, routing, mapping, and strategizing remained up to me. With typical confidence and optimism I simply pointed the route downloaded from bikepacking.com and relied on my skill and agility to see it through. As for the cultural aspect of the trip I wanted to be informed, I wanted to be invested, so I consumed 5 books about Cuba. The first, a 500 year history of the Cuban people. This assured me I’d be able to recognize statues, landmarks, and notable aspects of the country. The next, a book about the mob’s influence in the pre-Castro years and how they nearly pulled of a criminal dream: owning an internationally recognized government. A couple works of fiction from Hemingway helped give a lighter tone to my information gathering. Finally an exhaustive history of the Bacardi family and the largest private company to begin, flourish, evade, and finally escape a Communist Cuba all while remaining successful. I felt like I had learned Cuba. I was ready. So when the representative at the American Airlines counter in Phoenix, AZ chastised me for not knowing my cardboard bike box wasn’t allowed on a flight entering Cuba while saying, “did you even do your research before you planned a trip to Cuba?” I was taken aback. So taken that I initiated a five-alarm-fire drill to secure an EVOC bike bag from a teammate, return to the airport in an allowed piece of luggage, and paint an “F-You” smile on my face while I checked in for the flight. Research? Yeah lady, I’ve got this.
And I did.
Landing in Santiago de Cuba, passing through customs, building my bike outside the airport, changing into the riding gear I’d be using for the next 2 weeks all happened without incident. I got to my prearranged AirBnB in the heart of the city of 440,000 people, and double checked my gear. Currency is best exchanged in Cuba on the street or through a private party, like my AirBnB host. Done. Bottled water is tough to find as tourism is nearly non-existent outside of Havana so as I sat at a café overlooking a town square I calmly took in the scene and waved at the local kid walking by with a case of water. For the equivalent of less than $3 USD I had 18 bottles of water to carry back to my room. Done.
I’ve got this.
Day 1 departed town on pavement and hugged the rocky shoreline for nearly 30 miles. Bike, body, mind, and heart all working as designed. The formidable heat did press my sweat-soaked shirt against my back and put to the forefront of my mind the need to hydrate like a madman. I stopped at small roadside huts to buy a cold drink every 15 miles or so. Cold bottled water would be an elusive order for the days to come but sodas and beers could be found quite easily. The later would open a whole other can of troubles so I elected to drop my “soda is the devil” nutritional stance and suck down piña, cola, limón, and fresa flavored refrescos and accept the moment.
A final soda stop as I turned off the pavement and onto dirt came without consequence. Winding through the mountains brought me up close with unattended donkeys rambling about their day. While I dipped up and down through the wandering landscape I smiled at the adventure I had begun. Without a helping hand or an ear to bend I came to a foreign country with my bike, my gear, and an open mind for experience. Critical needs for a bikepacking adventure to be enjoyable. A critical adventure for my life to feel full.
But then the shine began to lose luster.
The first town I entered, Cruces del Baños, appeared lively. Great! A chance to enjoy some Cuban culture and meet some folks. This entering/exiting of towns on the Baja Divide would be a standout highlight of that monthlong adventure. Remembering our pattern of entering towns in MX I followed suit and hit the first store I saw. Bottled water, some snacks, and bulk cooking ingredients sat atop shelves behind a glass counter. I hinted to the storekeeper what I had desired and she asked if I had my tarjeta (credit card). “No, solo effectivo.” I only have cash, I replied. She quickly shook her head and looked back down to her counter. Ah-ha, I thought to myself. I had read that many stores are owned by the government and I wasn’t allowed to purchase from them but I didn’t know how that could be tracked when I was carrying cash. Query answered. No Cuban credit card? No store purchases. The same was true for the only other store in town so I found myself in a small courtyard with a sign that said “Pizza”. Another lesson from Baja, and bikepacking in general, is to eat what’s available and plenty of it so I ordered one. Hell, I’m drinking soda mind as well toss in some roadside pizza and hope the mathematically rule of negatives works in my favor.
It was only 2PM as I wiped the grease from my fingers and rolled my loaded bike back to the street. Plenty of time to put some miles away before the sun fades. I looked over my route and saw the next town wasn’t more than 25 miles away. An easy distance to cover based on what I’d seen thus far. Pushing off and following that route would be the single worst decision I made on my trip. I had no idea what I was in for and had I toned down my confidence just a bit and asked a local about the upcoming route I might’ve actually bike packed the whole island. Instead, I pressed on and continued to press on until pressing on remained my only painful option.
It’s nearly 5:15PM and I’m bent over my saddle exhausted. I haven’t pedaled a single bit since the last creek crossing. For 2.5 hours I’ve been walking in mud unable to mount my bike. I’d crossed paths with nearly half a dozen fieldworkers walking in the opposite direction with muck boots on. Many have kept pace and gave me nary a glance. A few have simply said “malo” and “fango” as I passed by. Bad. Mud. When the horse riders passed me I pulled aside and they suggested I turn back and I was unable to take their advice. The route says forward. The arrows on my bike computer say forward. If I don’t follow these arrows I’m not entirely sure of where I am so continue forward. But at 5:15, panting and desperate I think I should’ve never started forward. The degrading footpath I am on is littered with cow-sized boulders that I am heaving my bike up and over while perched on a pitch dancing between 10 and 20+% grade. I take only 6-12 steps before I need to take a small break. The horsemen I’d shared the path with earlier are long gone. The small pigs that followed me for a bit as I passed a hillside farming shack have retreaded for the night. I am crestfallen as I look down at the 2 bottles of water I have remaining and think about how I am going to build my tent on this muddy, steep hillside. For nearly 10 minutes I sit down and debate what to do. I zoom in and out on my bike computer hoping to glean some unseen route or source of inspiration. Failing to find a lifeboat I continue upward and with the fading light of day come to a small clearing. There’s an empty livestock pen and a small barn, both seem to have not been used for quite some time and can provide a bit of cover from the coming rain and wind so I quickly make my tent, peel off my muddy riding gear, and stand stark naked under the night’s sky. The fresh air feels right in all the wrong places and my spirits lift. I slide into the tent and pull on my dry baselayer wool pants and open my dinner: a pack of Duke’s Shorty Links and half a bottle of water. Without cell coverage I message Abbe, my wife, a predefined text on my SPOT device and settle in for the night. I’m struck at how comfortable I feel before I fall victim to a solid sleep. After all of the effort of the day and the feeling of hopelessness I’d wrestled I find myself comfortable and at-home in my nylon cocoon. Maybe this is the worst of it I thought as I faded off.
Some find it foolish. Others surely shake their head and try to push it away. My hope is a few use it themselves to find a light in their dark tunnel. No matter the impact on others my bottomless optimism while adventuring supports my “let’s go!” attitude. Pushing me further than my FTP or my carbon race wheels. Allowing me to press forward. That and my breakfast of a peanut butter CLIF Bar and my remaining 20oz of water kicked off Day 2 on La Ruta Mala.
To be certain I was on the correct route I hiked a 1/2 mile section of the rocky path before mounting my bike. The riding lasted only a short while before I found myself quickly disengaging from the pedals, going airborne, and landing softly on the slick rock slabs that seemed so easy to walk just an hour ago. Perfect my bubbling optimism replied. I forgot to take my morning selfie and this is a great spot!
I wouldn’t mount the bike for any mentionable distance again for nearly 4 hours.
It would be 2 hours of walking in mud threatening to keep hold of my foot, at the least collect my shoe as a trophy, before I cross a stream worthy of filtering water. I wasn’t entirely alone. Some farmers, very very small farms, would look up from their toils acknowledging my presence. One alerted me that I’d gone down the wrong fork in the road. Yessir I thought to myself. I’ve been known to pick the wrong fork many times. I returned to the proper route heeding the local advice. Another simply awed at my presence and gruffly told me more bad mud was ahead. He told me it’d been raining consistently for 3 months and the route is destroyed. I questioned the gusto that’d put me on this route. Couldn’t I have done better research to understand the conditions of the trail, I wondered? Realizing that research is simply relying on the data inputed from those who’d come before reminded me that I am the researcher. I was the first on route since the rain and there wasn’t anything to learn. I’ll become the teacher. That is if I ever find an exit from this muddy, suffocating route.
Perspective and attitude. They can change a situation without a single external variable moving one iota. Change your thinking. Change your circumstance. So while bounding down the slipper, rocky, muddy paths I glanced up to acknowledge another traveler heading toward me. He had on a muck boot. 1 muck boot. The other boot hadn’t been lost to that sucking mud pit he just exited. No. The other muck boot never made it onto his foot for he didn’t have a foot to put it on. A one-legged jungle farmer climbing the route I was struggling to slide down! With crutches under his arms he wasn’t out for a conquest to be shared on a marginally successful adventure company’s website. No. He was just going to work. Or heading home. Or going to find a lost donkey. Hell, who knows what he was doing because in my pissy attitude bemoaning my route I didn’t have the ability to stop and ask. If I had another minute to wipe away my shameful disposition I’d have maybe learned about him but he was gone. A passing reminder. A beautiful picture of an unfair advantage. I’d been thinking I had it bad. No water. No fresh egg breakfast. No idea of how long the mud lasted. Well, he had no leg. Surely no breakfast. And obviously no reason to hunker down licking his wounds. Pressing on just got a lot easier. And I thought I had optimism…
The mud ended.
I see people milling about their homes.
I stop and give a young boy a chocolate chip CLIF Bar. Think about it. Some mud covered gringo exits a path that in the past 3 months has been braved by only the bravest or most desperate and drops a snack in your hand. I’m hoping he’s telling that story at school today. If he goes to school. If he has the chance.
Patches of mud on the improved dirt road still halt my progress. I forgo dancing across these pits, pointless in my current state, and plod through without care for bike or body. Others hopscotch their way walking in the opposite direction. Everyone gives me a look. I wish I’d taken the time to talk with them but I needed food and a coffee and a town was near. Pulling into (TOWN NAME) fulfilled my senses with clopping horse hooves, the rattling of the wooden wheels they pulled, chatter, and hollers. Another lively small town complete with a town square anchoring its activity. I plopped down at the first cafe I see and order a coffee. They don’t have food. Just coffee. Just perfect. Before I can enjoy my first sip the weight of a million eyes presses upon me. I’m being looked over and examined by anyone who catches my sight. I only begin to understand their wonder as I bring that wonderful cup of liquid gold to my lips. Fingers, covered in mud. I look further to hands, covered in mud. Arms, chest, back, legs, shoes, bike, who knows about my face? I’ve exited a section of their land that few navigate and I’ve done so with a bike loaded with large bags and a 6’1” Swamp Thing of pale skin. I’m an alien. An alien calmly sipping coffee at their cafe. I’d be eyeballing me too.
Food.
Where is food?
I see a coupe of restaurants but they don’t appear to be open. I find another snack stand but it’s only got a refrigerator of drinks and sugary snacks. Where is the grand egg breakfast I am pining for?! I sweep the streets branching off the main square and come up empty. Returning to the only lines of people I’ve seen cements my understanding of reliable Cuban cuisine. Pizza. Two pizza stands providing the only lunches in town. 100 Cuban Pesos (CUP) for a personal sized pizza. Sometimes with sauce and cheese, sometimes just oil and cheese, this one offered a soupy mix of chorizo and gravy. 100 CUP = $0.33 USD. I splurge and drop 66 cents US for 2 pizzas and plop down on the curb. A king’s feast.
Returning to the downloaded route proves impossible. Meeting another section of unavoidable mud isn’t the adventure I’d signed up for. Learning from my mistake a town ago I ask the pizza chef about my options: 1) the route I planned or 2) the paved highway. Without hesitation he pointed down the road. I didn’t need perfect Spanish to hear that the original route would be more terrible mud and misery. He told me my goal destination, a seaside town that painted pictures of fresh fish and sandy beaches in my mind, was a long way off. Nearly 80 km he pointed. How long will that take you? That’s a long way friend. I loved the look on his face when I told him I’d be there in a few hours. He praised my strength and with his doughy, greasy fare fueling my feeling of contentment I smiled and pushed off. Yes good sir. I am tough.
Tough by American standards perhaps. By Cuban standards? I’m not so sure. The guy with the crutches carved an image in my head and heart. The workers swinging rakes up and overhead in fluid arcs manually mowing the grasses along the highway looked pretty damn tough. And this guy who’s caught up beside me? This hombre pedaling like a madman on a rusty singlespeed cruiser bike just dropped me! These friendly, gentle Cubans? Tough as nails!
Manzanillo sits on the sea boasting a maleçon (coastline boardwalk) and I’ve always attached a maleçon with fresh food hanging, chilling, or sizzling at small stands. If one can wrestle back their growling, begging stomach from lurching at the first sautéed snack there’s a chance to see it all. And maybe snag a multicolored friendship bracelet along the way. No instant-gratification wrestling challenged me in Manzanillo. The opposite scenario reared its vicious visage. No food. Again. One boarded up dilapidated restaurant sat along the ocean wall and another ghost town event center and restaurant combo plaza rested unoccupied on the opposite side of the street. It took another town lap to settle at a small dimly lit restaurant on a side street. Manzanillo drew an eerie comparison to towns I’ve seen in war movies based in desert locales. The buildings looked not half constructed, as is typical in developing parts of the world, but torn down by neglect or battling the weather that surely pounds this southern coastal town. After two plates of food and a coffee (cost = $6-ish US for a king’s feast) the waitress pointed me in the direction of a room for rent. For another $20 US I had a comfortable room, bathroom, and most appreciated a high powered A/C unit. They didn’t offer any laundry facilities but another $10 US inspired my host to hand wash my nasty clothing and hang dry my man-diaper-cycling-bib next to the Christmas garland adorning the main room. Finally, in an effort to splurge, another $10 got me my host’s husband’s flip flops for mine flew fearlessly from my frame sometime in the morning. For a town without a shopping center, a restaurant scene, public access to the beach, or anything else I’d mistakenly assumed would be available I settled into bed with all of my needs fully met.
Drawing from Brian’s successful route planning a couple years earlier I decided to pick an attainable destination and then backtrack the most confident path to get there. Lacking Brian’s deep-dive research habits I drew 2 simple lines. One went North and the second West. Neither went off-road. So I rode North and then West. And that’s it. No adventure. No grand views or cultural embrace. No unexpected treats or life-changing, mood-lifting experiences. 30 miles of flat highway North. A quick turn featuring a small stand with thimble sized cups of Cuban coffee (I had 5 of them for 50 pesos or 17 cents USD) and an expired package of cookies satisfied my need for a delayed breakfast and then 30 miles West. Straight lines that were in fact straight roads. 60 miles of hunched over bikepacking down the highway. Granted it was better than a day spent on Zwift, but not by much. I found myself at a crossroad, emotionally. In between pounding pedals and sipping piña soda I danced about three futures. 1) continue to explore Cuba via the paved routes and hope the town experiences improve thus providing a cultural experience worth having. 2) return to the off-road route as my eternal optimism tank had begun to refill as the mud receded further into memory. 3) call it and make my way back to Santiago de Cuba and ultimately home to Colorado. What to do? Where to go? How to get there?
Options and means. Unlimited access. Unrestricted problem solving. These US-standards I’ve not taken for granted for that would require thinking of them as things that could be taken away, no, these standards are just… standard. Part of the way I live life. Part of my adventuring. Cuba highlighted how very special they truly are. Cuba showcased how rare these standards are in a country so close and at the same time so very far. The kind, strong, quiet people I’ve interacted with navigate a limited, restricted daily existence. Do they have goals and dreams? I’m not certain but it doesn’t appear those goals or dreams stretch too far from the well worn roads of their small communities and fields. Each day I’d see so many up early and hustling here and there but I never knew to where. Without hubs of commerce, lively streets, or major industry I couldn’t pinpoint where all the action headed. I’d watched young women hoist their children into the back of a wooden cart and be wheeled out of town by horse. To where? Most of the schools I saw seemed closed. I’d see a truck full of laborers motor past me but never see more than a single field worker emerge from the long, lonely mud roads cut into rice or sugarcane fields. Witnessing this and juxtaposing it with my life gave clarity to my future path. I’m leaving Cuba. I’ve not felt this level of guilt on any adventure to date. While my granite-hard quads and superhuman low heart rate have done wonders for the options I have in life, my single greatest skill was delivered not by a gym session or a macro-balanced meal. No. My greatest gift came as the stork dropped me into the young arms of my parents. In the United States. By dumb luck I’d been born in Silvis, Illinois, USA. Undeserved. Unearned. Uninvolved. Nearly 42 years later I have the ability to change my fate with a few finger jabs on my phone. Fortunate? Absolutely. Guilty? Yessir.
Quitting La Ruta Mala took a few days. I’d need a bus ride back to Santiago and as a foreigner I couldn’t use the standard bus service so had to book the expensive, fancy bus. It was only $20 USD. I’d need another couple of night’s stay in Santiago. It was only another $20 USD per night. The financial burden was light but I didn’t know the emotional cost. Would I soon regret bailing on the tip-to-tip island conquest?
Agreeing with myself that quitting the route provided the best path forward I struggled with how to share the mental Mousetrap board I navigated with those following along. What do I tell my bike buds? What do I tell my family who accepted, willingly or not, that I wasn’t staying around for Christmas? Most importantly, what do I tell my wife who with tickets in hand and bag packed expected to be spinning atop the floor as we learn advanced salsa dancing moves in Cuba?!
The solution landed as obviously as my decision to turn back. I would do the most sensible thing. I wouldn’t tell her.
My final day and a half in Santiago de Cuba reenacted the theme of Brewster’s Millions. I had fistfuls of Cuban pesos and no agenda. With the clandestine return to the US underway I was a ghost in the second largest city in Cuba. I stripped my bike of its cargo and freewheeled around town ducking into every alleyway, staircase, and pothole-marked side street that tickled my interest. I made my way out to the coast and paid a nominal entry to the only tourist activity I could find. Exploring, on foot, the narrow passageways of an old fort, picking up surprisingly compact and heavy cannonballs from the bygone pirate fighting era, and looking down the seaboard to the route I had pedaled days before offered a brief escape from the negatively feelings I’d thus attached to my Cuban cultural experience. Having read that activities such as this are common in Havana I more clearly understood why I was so ill prepared for the Cuba I experienced. Had I opted for the standard “American goes to Cuba” itinerary I’d have been touring cultural institutions, rolling cigars in a guided class, and firmly dialing in that salsa swing. Perhaps I’d have a different outlook on Cuba as a tourist. The lore of Cuban nights spent in revelry harken back to the days when Americans treated this island like a fantasy land. During Prohibition Americans would come here to swirl drinks, hire short-term companions, and laugh away their problems back home. The mobsters built an empire on the vices that brought color to lives. Before then the southern plantation owners sought out Cuba as land owners hellbent on keeping their slaveholding way of life afloat. The lawlessness of the land and the malleability of its leadership allowed Cuba to thrive as a hedonistic outlet for the overfed, overdrunk, illicit partygoers in America. Decades later, as I spent my final days pedaling to distant coves and through tiny villages peppering the shoreline I too was an overfed American looking to take from the island. I wanted to take an adventure story. I wanted to take a Strava route snapshot of an island conquered. What I learned in those final hours as my pockets remained stuffed with pesos for there were no markets, boutiques, or souvenir shops to trade paper for goods, was that this island is not for taking. Not if you have a conscious. This island must be for giving. Those kind, strong, and quiet Cubans deserve more than their dealt hand. Every person does. The 90 mile strip of land their stork deposited them on was also through dumb luck. Undeserved. Unearned. Recognizing this helped me unload those pesos that would be toilet paper upon my return to the US. Instead of looking for more items to add to my bulging bags I simply handed them out. The barber who happily waved me into his shop as I passed by with an already buzzed head? He got 8,000 CUP. The women who brought me coffee and breakfast each morning at the hotel? 8,000 CUP. And then their staff host and the housekeeper and the guy who’d kept my bike bag at the airport several days earlier. By the time I’d finally connected with a greater purpose for being in Cuba, that is to give not take, I found getting rid of my stuffed pockets was quite easy.
Returning home came without incident. Connecting through Miami’s gleaming hallways, stuffed kiosks, and numerous eateries brought not a single moment of discomfort or want. Fresh water poured from fountains and bottle refill stations. More resources were left abandoned at plastic chairs than could be found in all of Cuba. My only challenge came in keeping Abbe bamboozled. I’d told her I was hitting a large section without service and would reconnect when able. Not specifically a falsehood. Lying is bad. I didn’t have phone service at 38,000’. My bike bag hadn’t arrived at DIA by the time I’d made it to the carousel and my anticipation of hugging her drove me to the American Airlines Baggage Office.
“What happens if I don’t pick up my bag?” I asked.
“We hold them for 5 days and you can collect them any time,” the agent responded.
“In the past you’ve delivered them if there’s an issue,” I volleyed.
“Yes, but not if you are choosing to simply not wait,” she countered.
“Ah, fair. I only live 15 minutes away so I can come back.”
“Oh, you’re that close? Give me your address and bag claim and I’ll have them delivered later,” she kindly offered.
And just like that lonely win at the slot machine in Vegas her simply gesture washed away 100’s of losses in the wonky world of DIA baggage service.
Abbe’s car sat in the driveway. I saw it while walking into our cul-de-sac. I’d had the Uber driver drop me off so I couldn’t be seen by the neighbors. In my new, used Cuban flip-flops, I pattered around the side of our house, slipped into the backyard, and entered our home from the basement sliding door. I didn’t have anything with me. I’d left all of my clothes, shoes, and gear in Cuba folded neatly on the hotel bed. They’d have far more use for them than I. Slowly I crept up our stairs and waited for confirmation Abbe was home. I heard her voice and with that opened the door. I came into the living room as if I’d been downstairs the whole time. Her spoonful of chicken tortilla soup hung in her hand as her brain tried to reconcile the image in front of her. She could clearly see her husband standing tall, safe at home, and yet her brain was scrambled. He’s in Cuba her brain reminded her and yet her eyes told a competing story. Holding firm I let the two competing realities wrestle and only when one had been pinned did I reach for her and the hug I’d been pining for on those lonely stretches of highway.
Home for Christmas.
Done with Cuba.
More photos below.
For video and commentary find my saved highlight on Instagram: HERE
Have questions about your own trip to Cuba? Ask away.
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