Cuba Notebook

Like all odd places, Cuba attracts odd people. When I first started visiting in 1993, straggle-bearded men boarded the Soviet-built Air Cubana jet from Stansted. Where to go first, comrade, they wondered? The tractor factory at Cienfuegos or the collective tobacco farm in Trinidad? Like the Cubana flights, the fellow-travellers have long departed. Still, it’s reassuring to find Cuba still attracts oddballs. Sitting next to me on the Virgin flight from Gatwick are two middle-aged Glaswegians. He’s a trainspotter, she’s a twitcher. They ignore the food, booze and movies and fill orange notebooks with lists of the diesel locomotives and warblers they want to tick off. They’re so engrossed, they don’t leave their seats for nine hours and scarcely speak. Calling all Scottish anoraks! You can sit next to me any time. You’re the best travelling companions.

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Mr and Mrs McGeek are way better than the old-timer with whom I share a cab from José Martí airport into town.