We had really wanted to go to the northern coast and have a look at the Cayos. Horizontes had only one hotel there, "La casona de Moron". Since it has only seven rooms or so, it will come as no surprise that this place is always full.

We chose to go via Sancti Spiritus in stead. The road from Holguin to Camaguey is basically quite boring, as the landscape is more or less flat and a bit uninteresting. The most interesting is just to watch how the Cubans move from A to B, using horses, bikes, sidecars or just anything that moves.

It's a long ride from Holguin to Sancti Spiritus, but the ZaZa hotel rewards you with a true oasis of calmness. The surrounding waters were created when a dam was put up. Entire villages have been submerged in the resulting lake. Standing on the edge you see an old chimney or two stick out of the lake. Surrealism. We arrived in the late afternoon after a day of driving. The birds were singing (there were very many of them) as the sun was about to set. The lake looked very beautiful, if you enjoy fishing or bird hunting you should probably check out renting a boat & guide. We just enjoyed the silence, something that is sometimes hard to find in Cuba.

We had an extremely good Cocktail in the hotel-bar, one Piña Colada and a Mojito. As the town was about 8 kilometers away we were once more obliged to eat in the Hotel, because driving after dark is not very easy in Cuba. There are many holes in the road that you spot during the day, but you would drive in to them after dark.

The food at this Hotel was Okay, but nobody really prefers eating in a hotel. The next day we would head for Corralillo.