My thoughts on the hotel. The view is beautiful! The rooms are nice and clean. The beaches are not that nice. Dark sand with many sand fleas! There is a shortage of supplies so they were reusing plastic cups and only rinsing them, not washing thoroughly which was disgusting. The cleaning lady for our room did not replenish our toilet paper for 4 days, even though I repeatedly asked at reception and still never got any, so one of the guests we befriended got me toilet paper from the public washrooms in the foyer. Also, the variety of food was lacking. Hardly any fresh fruit and no fish considering we were surrounded by water.

Tips never seemed enough. We hired a taxi to take us to the city and I wanted to see San Pedro de la Roca Castle which was 25 minutes from Santiago and he said it was too far. This seemed unreasonable to me as we were paying him 100 CUC for the day considering the government pays them less then 20 cuc a month. I know that the quality of life there is horrible. One of the employees told me she had to rip up her shirt for her daughter as they had no feminine products. For me this is a necessity and no women should have to experience this! In Santiago de Cuba, there were so many starving people begging on the streets. It was so sad. For me this was not a vacation! I left feeling sorry for the people, wondering why the government won't provide a better life and not happy with the service I received. We spent over 500 cuc on tips and the service was still unpleasant. Also, between the singers, the wait staff and bartenders it really didn't seem we had enough money. I read a post that said the individual felt like an ATM machine to the Cubans and it is very true.

The only thing that is hurting the tourism in Cuba is the way the Cuban government is starving and depriving their people. I also do not see why they don't work on developing themselves. There is so much land there and they can do more farming and manufacturing. The government seems to want to keep the country from development which is very backwards thinking in my opinion!

In conclusion, now is not a good time to visit Cuba. With no supplies reaching the Island and the people starving for basic products such as hygiene and food, it leaves you feeling unsatisfied and frustrated. There is only so much you can do to help!

Sierra mar was fine, a lot of return guests rave about this place, I have travelled extensively through Cuba so I knew what I was getting into but for people that are expecting it be like other resorts in varadero will be definitely disappointed, the theft from Locals on the property on the weekends is ridiculous, the elevator was broke most of the time, and I was once stuck on it for 40 minutes before it was fixed. They ran out of water for around 16 hours from mid afternoon through to the next morning which made things very difficult as you could not even flush your toilet, when I approached the front desk the manager on hand who had already been very rude and short with me already about simple requests told me that she had other more important things to worry about than the fact that there was no water, there was a snack bar that would start cooking in the afternoon around 330 but they would let the food sit cold until they opened at 430, I twice went there and was declined food, the pro’s the entertainment they had was some of the best I’ve experienced the pool bartender and house magician Alberto was amazing and Jose upstairs at the sports bar made one of the best mojitos in Cuba, they have a 24 hour lobby bar that also has amazing entertainment Daily. If the price is too good to be true it usually is.