How to Travel to Cuba: A Guide for Americans
When the U.S. eased the travel ban on Cuba in 2014 (after first easing it in 2009), they allowed U.S. citizens to travel to Cuba for 1 of 12 reasons.
In November 2017, Trump increased the restrictions, but the restrictions were fairly easy to abide by, and you shouldn't let them deter you from visiting!
Planning Activities
In order to make sure we were totally in line with the law, we used a special service called ViaHero. They planned our itinerary entirely (which we modified as we went through the days), and answered our myriad questions before the trip, which gave us some additional comfort.
There were a couple reasons we chose to hire someone, instead of planning everything on our own as we normally do:
As I mentioned above, U.S. Citizens have special rules around visiting the country, and we wanted to abide by those rules.
We had to have an entire itinerary planned. According to the latest rules, every weekday in Cuba must be spent with a "full-time schedule" to "Support the Cuban people" (more on that below).
We had read that there's no reliable internet in the country, preventing us from planning as we normally do (get there with a loose idea of what we want to do, then plan more concrete itineraries in-country). Additionally, we were both fairly busy leading up to the trip and didn't have much time to plan our entire itinerary.
There's not that much information on the internet. We wanted to do and see local things, not just the classic tourist stuff.
We had read that tourists often get ripped off, especially by taxis. We figured a local could help us get closer-to-local prices.
Money Preparation
It's important to prep for this!
Before leaving the States, request Euros from a bank. There's a 10% penalty for exchanging US Dollars there, so we made sure to bring Euros to exchange. Read more here.
Bring cash, even if it's USD. American cards (and thus ATM's) do not work in Cuba, and I've heard horror stories of people having to call home to have friends wire money to their AirBNB hosts, etc.
Upon arrival, and again before departure, we exchanged money at the airport. You're not technically allowed to take money out of the country (though, ironically, they actually ran out of Euros to give us, so we may have a couple Cuban pesos still...).
Tourist Card / Flights
Some people suggest you fly into another country (eg. Mexico, Panama) and then book a separate flight (on a separate itinerary) from that country into Cuba (to pretend you're not flying from the States). We didn't find that necessary at all, so I wouldn't suggest it. Our flights happened to be from SFO to Panama City to Cuba (and back the same way), but on one itinerary.
Print your itinerary. We had to present our return flights and fill out a form in America before flying.
Purchase a Tourist Card at the airport. If you connect through a second country (we connected in Panama), you should get the Card at the gate counter in that country. Most airlines include the Tourist Card in the price of the airplane ticket. Read more here. We flew Copa Airlines, and it was included. At the gate in Panama City, we went up to the counter and asked for the Tourist Card.
Support for the Cuban People
Generally, to be in accordance with this category of visit, you have to do the following:
Stay at a casa particular or Airbnb.
Support and engage with local businesses and independent entrepreneurs, including musicians, food vendors, artists, etc, for six hours every weekday. Visiting museums, exploring art shows, or taking dance classes are also in this category.
Eat at local restaurants or paladares.
Avoid transactions with military-owned businesses.
Again, this is why we had someone else plan our itinerary. For more info, this is the US Government's Code on it. Honestly, though, it's not too hard — thorough research on what to do in the country should be able to help you to craft a sufficient schedule.
Housing
To abide by the rules required to "Support the Cuban People," one must stay in a Casa Particular. Many places on AirBNB are Casa Particulars, and if you've never stayed with AirBNB before, this is a really good time to do it! Sign up here to receive $20 off your first reservation of $75+. The views from some of these places are phenomenal.
Areas I would recommend are El Vedado, Centro Havana, and Old Havana. More recommendations can be found here and here.
Final Thoughts
While planning Cuba was more work than some of our other trips, we actually ran into very few issues. No one stopped us to make sure our itinerary perfectly matched our days there, or to check that we had receipts for every activity we engaged in (supposedly, U.S. tourists should keep receipts for up to five years after leaving the country), or stopped to question us when we came back to the States. It was actually a really smooth process in and out of Cuba, and even coming back into the States. Honestly, there are few Americans in Cuba who would even care that you're there, and Cubans are, for the most part, really glad you're there. All the news aside, it's a trip worth planning for and going on!
