Congratulations to Gerardo Galván for setting a new WUCA point-to-point record from Cabo San Antonio to Santa Clara in the following categories: Male, 18-49 age group, standard bike.
Record Attempt: Faro Roncali, the most western point of Cuba – Santa Clara, city of Che Guevara.
Rider: Gerardo “Coloso” Rojano Galván
Start Time: 4:58 am 5/29/25
Starting Location: Faro Roncali is the Lighthouse at Cabo San Antonio, the most western point of Cuba. You can get as close as 3m to it, only a fence stops you from getting closer.
The story…
I arrive at La Havana on the 28th of may at 9pm, I took a cab to Faro Roncali that same night. We passed Pinar del Rio and headed to Cabo San Antonio where the lighthouse is. It is a very remote part of Cuba, right next to a Biospher National Park. At 50k to get there is a military control that very kindly let us through when I explained I was trying to go from the lighthouse to Santa Clara by bike. I wasn’t aware of this military checkpoint, the soldier went inside the cabin and made a call, he let us through. I got to the lighthouse at 4:30am, got my bike ready and the cab left me by myself. There was nothing else for me to wait so at 4:58am.
The first 100K are a very poor asphalt, there is a 10K part that is nothing but holes. This is after passing the military checkpoint on the way back going to Pinar del Río. I knew there was no public lighting in any of the Cuban roads, not even the highways, so you need to have good light, fortunately I knew this and was prepared. I got to the first town around 10am to have breakfast, the stores are called Kiosko, and they have very few things on sale. Water and soda are always available. I rode that day 17 hours; passed Pinar del Río where I had lunch and kept going until 98K outside La Habana where I spent the night on a house on the side of the road. This is very common and safe, you can ask people if they have a place for you to sleep and most of the time they have (I paid 500 pesos). It was around 7pm, my plan was to get to La Habana but I was too tired cuz I didn’t slept much on the ride to the lighthouse and my plane from Mexico left early with one stop so I was done for the day.
Next morning, I started pedalling at 4am, got to La Habana around 11:30am and had breakfast; always buying water from the Kioskos on the road. Try not to miss one cuz they are very far apart. I needed cash so I spend 5 hours looking for a place to get out money with my card. There is no way you can get money out of the bank or an ATM!!! you need cash all the time I didn’t realized this until later. I got a little bit lost in La Habana. After losing time at the bank and getting lost for 16K I found my way to keep going East, towards Santa Clara.
I left La Habana very late, around 6pm, and rode the rest of the day until 11pm. I found a Paradero (a place for truckers to sleep and eat) and stay there for free! At the beginning he wated to charge me 20usd and I told him that last night I paid 500 pesos; he counter offer was 5,000 pesos and I told him I was Mexican not Spanish, I told my story to the clerk and he offered me a room free. Cubans are extremely helpful and very nice people. On the road people carry fruit on their bikes, I offer someone to buy some mangos and he immediately gave them for free. Please, set aside politics and governments; people are one thing and their government is something else. Cubans are fantastic people!
I woke up at 4am and road headed to Santa Clara, worried about the money, I thought that in Santa Clara I could find a CADECA (exchange money place) where someone told me I might get money with my card, which was not possible as I later found out. I got around 4pm to the intersection for Santa Clara or continue East. I was low on money, maybe for one more day, so I decided to head to Santa Clara and see what I could do. At a hotel, Santa Clara Libre, I was well advised by the people there that there was no way I could get money out with my bank card cuz it was a debit card! Debit cards don´t work in Cuba specially if they are the new kind that have a chip included, like mine. I decided to stop there… and made my final destination Santa Clara.
Going back to La Habana was another different adventure! Eventually, FYI, a friend was able to wire me money but it wasn’t as simple as that; it took me a long time to find the right people to do it, fortunately I have a friend, Ernesto, a Cuban tour guide that helped me with lots of things like a Cuban chip for the phone (internet is awful it works only in major cities and around La Habana, the furthest you get the less signal you will have), he was also the guy who find the cab that took us to Roncali cuz nobody wants to go that far, for most Cubans, Pinar del Rio is the last town of Cuba and there is nothing else after that. In many aspects its true.
Something else to keep in mind are the blackouts, there are severe blackouts in all the country. There are places that have only 4 hours of electricity per day, others have less. Only in La Habana I was able to charge my external battery (take one, it’s a compulsory item you should take, recharge bike lights and Garmin, keep most of the time your cell phone off, in any case there is not much signal). I was never lucky and didn’t have electricity outside La Habana.
It was a fantastic experience, despite the money issue, I’m definitely going back to start again and cover the whole distance, from W – E, lighthouse to lighthouse. I recommend to do a previous visit to Cuba just to get the idea of what you are doing. I didn’t and have many things that didn’t had in mind.
The roads are safe to ride, including at night. For one thing there is very low traffic but also there are many motorbikes and bicycles so people are aware of you all the time. Like I said the first part is very bad pavement but still you can make the effort to ride, take all your gear and tools cuz you won’t find anything there, but the most important thing to keep in mind people are fantastic! Be kind and get everywhere with a smile and everyone will support you, help you, treat you well…I always got something extra with my food, either fruit or a candy and even if you don’t get anything in return, you will always be treated well and they will be interested in what you are doing.