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Vinales Valley
Vinales Valley is a lush green valley of round-topped hills, which dates back to the Jurassic era and has been added to the World Heritage list. The hills or mogotes date back to the Jurassic period and are covered with rich and varied vegetation, and are remnants of the plateau that was eroded by a network of underground rivers millions of years ago.
Situated just over one hundred miles from Havana the Vinales Valley offers a lush landscape of untouched wilderness and a scenic natural environment. The natural beauty and tranquillity of the valley is interspersed with green fields of tobacco, coffee and other crops that grow out of the rich red earth, where traditional agricultural techniques have remained unchanged for centuries. Scattered palm trees and pine forests shelter a variety of melodious birds, and the area is also a magnet for speleologists, being riddled with limestone caves and caverns.
The vibrant green interior offers a sloping hilly landscape, with rustic villages and quaint barns, a terrain of oxen ploughed fields, unique underground rivers and fascinating caves that offer a striking contrast to the colonial grandeur and white sandy beaches found on the rest of the island. The main valley village, Vinales, is a charming, very laid-back place that makes a good base to explore the beautiful surrounds.
Gran Caverna de Santo Tomás
The Gran Caverna de Santo Tomás are just ten miles west of Vinales and are the largest maze of caves in Cuba, stretching over twenty nine miles and consisting of underground chambers and galleries on eight different levels below ground. Very informative 90-minute guided tours take visitors 138ft (42m) above the valley floor into the sixth gallery where fantastic limestone formations, glittering stalactites and stalagmites, underground lakes and vast caverns are revealed by the light of headlamps. The cave system has been kept in its natural state, avoiding the tourist traps of electrical lighting and souvenir stands.
Address: El Moncada; Opening time: Daily 8.30am to 5pm; Admission: 8 CUCs
