Cuba?

[RForester]

Can we boat to Cuba now?

 

[tim h]

There is a thread over on The Hull Truth about Cuba...

http://www.thehulltruth.com/florida-georgia/712516-cuba-2016-a.html

 

[robert843]

This is a tricky subject. The simple answer is yes and I believe the have lifted the restriction of having to apply for a permit to do so but please verify that through another source as I was told that second hand. The real issue with this trip is not can you go its where will you stay and where will you keep your boat unfortunately there is not s real good infrastructure with quality marinas or lodging at those marinas yet. This is probably one of those trips that is best left alone for a few years till that stuff gets built up. Right now you would likely be leaving your boat at a crappy marina and staying inland and praying your boat was there in one piece when you came back each day.

 

[DieselCamel]

Agree.. This is definitely on my list in the next couple of years.

 

[JROD]

This is a tricky subject. The simple answer is yes and I believe the have lifted the restriction of having to apply for a permit to do so but please verify that through another source as I was told that second hand. The real issue with this trip is not can you go its where will you stay and where will you keep your boat unfortunately there is not s real good infrastructure with quality marinas or lodging at those marinas yet. This is probably one of those trips that is best left alone for a few years till that stuff gets built up. Right now you would likely be leaving your boat at a crappy marina and staying inland and praying your boat was there in one piece when you came back each day.

It is doable and I am game to do it soon one way or the other on my jet ski! ;-) I have several family members that made it across on truck inner tubes. It burns me up beyond belief that right here in this great USA blessed land of ours, that some, at times, many fools right now supporting Socialist Communist Bernie Sanders that still have the freaking illusion that these type of oppressive forms of government will work better than our American Democratic Republic! It is by now probably in the millions the number of Cubans that out of misery and utter desperation threw themselves in to the ocean on their quest for our American dream and freedom. Thousands have perished! I know it up close and personal since some of those were family!
I have a cousin that just went a week or so ago on the 1st cruise ship out of Miami that has been to Cuba in over 55 years. Perhaps, there is merit to waiting a few years etc, before conditions and infrastructure improves, but that is not going to happen as fast as we Americans expected! I saw similar after the Berlin wall felt down, and Germany is the exception to the rule in having transformed the decrepit, in ruins, deprived, bankrupt, former East Germany to the prosperity that it enjoys today. But remember, not easily repeatable, West Germany is Europa's most prosperous nation, had a huge budget surplus, and it cost then zillions they are still paying till today. Where would that money come from in Cuba which is in equal or perhaps worse shape than East Germany was? Some from ambitious entrepreneurs and business men like my cousin, but that is a drop in the ocean in comparison to what is required to rebuild, retrain and reeducate a society that has been enslaved in poverty, misery and lack of freedom for nearly 60 years. Sorry did not mean to get political or philosophical here. So I am interested in going soon! What would have happened to America and how much longer it would taken to settle the west if we did not have trail blazers among us that led the way with minimum essential to survive and no infrastructure? ;-) I am one of those types. ;-) Agreed, is probably not for everybody, but think about it, which experience do you rather have? The one that allows you to see things early with all the bad, the ugly, uglier, and perhaps and adventure of a life time not easily repeatable later that you can make part of your legacy and talk about until your dying days, or wait for the boring Club Med experience with the millions of other timid souls? ;-) Let's do like the Nike motto, plan it and JUST DO IT!!!