6th of September, 2025.
The first person to stop for me is a man from New Zealand called Greg. He’s been living here for many years now. As I tell him I want to go to Port Havana, he tells me he can drop me off at the marina, where he’s going. Cool!
The marina is just a tiny little place, with an anchor for a few boats. Greg is going fishing with a few locals in his quite big boat. Before he leaves, he tells me that there’s a camping place just a short walking distance from the marina, by the beach.
I walk to the place and it seems nice but quite abandoned / not operating. I see some locals around and I wonder what’s going on. I plan to do some sunbathing but luckily, I don’t. But I do take a walk around the corals and see some cute colorful tiny little fish, and some corals.
When I come back to the beach, a man come to talk with me. He explains to me that a company rented the whole place for the employees working in the restoration of a resort nearby, so I cannot stay here. OK. I was planning to camp here tonight and in Port Havana another night, but I can simply leave right now. And that’s what I do.
I walk by the beach until a resort called Trees and Fishes. I stay there for some hours, sunbathing (trying) and chilling. I have two granola bars the whole day. Late afternoon, I come to the resort to ask if I can camp by the beach. There are only a few guests around. When I ask to talk with the manager, I meet three workers from the kitchen: Lissie (the waitress), Ingrid (chef), and a younger girl who’s the sub-chef. As I’m waiting for the manager, they give me a kind of burger / sandwich, and a glass of apple juice, without me even asking! Yay! We talk for some time and I tell them my story. They understand what I came here to ask, and finally they tell me that, the piece of land just beside of the resort, with a stone building in it, actually belongs to Lissie, so I can camp there for the night. Yay!
Unfortunately, after some time, a man comes over and stay there. During the day, there were a few older men spending some time here, just sitting and watching their phones. And there was also a boy. So I’m guessing this is a kind of spot where they come to just chill. But I don’t know who this man is and what’s going on. Plus, he’s making a lot of noises, coughing and spiting all the time. I stay for some time and just believe that it will be OK, but at some point I simply decide to leave. The girls told me before that Lissie’s house is just nearby here, so I think that I can just ask her to camp in her backyard. I stand up and pack all my things. The girls told me they normally work until 22.00 hours. It’s now soon after 20.00 hours, so I walk back to the resort.
I’ve heard some people laughing out loud and singing, and I thought they were guests. It is actually the staff. That’s surprising. And the guest’s bedrooms are not far away or anything, so I’m sure they would’ve heard it as well. Anyway, everybody is surprised to see me, and they behave quite weirdly too. The manager practically ignores me, and the girls… I don’t know, they don’t seem super keen to help or anything. When I tell them what happened, they conclude that the guy is Lissie’s brother, and I should’ve just talked to him and explain everything. How the hell would I supposed to know? What were they even thinking? I wanted to see they going to a foreigner country and while camping outside talk to a stranger guy hanging around their tent at night. They tell me that the coughing and the spiting is because he’s drinking Kava. Of course. It’s a bit of an awkward situation. They go and talk with the guy and when they come back they say I can go back there. And then they leave.
The guy moved a bit further away, to another gazebo kind of thing which actually has lights on, while here, where I am, there’s not. But again, when you drink Kava, you want to do it in the darkness.
In the morning, I leave quite early. I wish I could ask for some food or just some bread, but I guess this is not really that kind of place which I can ask for that. Plus, all the girls from yesterday are off today, so new staff, who I don’t know, will be working in the kitchen.
I start walking towards Siviri, the next village I want to visit. I make a small mistake which would cost me a lot of peace of mind: I wear my Crocks instead of my boots.
10 Years Around the World 