is over-the-top elegant, from the fresh white cala lilies that are so abundant, you can smell them from the glass elevator, to the in-room espresso machines. Flat screen TVs, high-tech bathroom glass that frosts at the flick of a switch, luxurious king-sized beds in a chic color scheme and (wait for it!) free Wi-Fi, await once you slip your card in the door. This is real, European-standard luxury, heretofore unknown in Havana.
Sure, there are other “five star” hotels in the vicinity, but the Gran Hotel Manzana Kempinski knows no competition. Hands-on, detail-oriented General Manager Xavier Destribats explained the strategy to me: “This is Kempinski’s first property in the Americas, it’s our flagship, and we worked very closely with City Historian Eusebio Leal to honor the history and charm of Havana.” Destribats points to the courtyard between the hotel and the Museo de Bellas Artes, which will soon be landscaped to create a public green space, the restored plaza and fountain nearby, and the long section of Habana Vieja’s original wall dating from the 1600s that has been restored and preserved in the hotel museum. The overall layout emphasizes privacy and luxury, with several patios, balconies, and lobbies, planted and exquisitely furnished, that are ideal for a business meeting or tryst. The views of the Bacardí building, an art deco jewel, from the spa sundeck and the bird’s eye view of the Floridita from the Bar Daiquirí are a location scout’s wet dream. The Jacuzzis, saunas, private massage rooms, and salon in the spa are Palm Desert quality (day passes available) and there’s a gym so well-equipped you’ll feel guilty not using it.
Even if you can’t afford a night here, splash out with drinks and dinner on the 6th floor where you’ll be treated to Havana’s money shot: uninterrupted views of the Museo de Bellas Artes, the Gran Teatro, Parque Central, and the Hotel Inglaterra. Unfortunately, the neon blue infinity pool here is only open to guests.
YOU’VE SEEN IT IN PHOTOS—AT daybreak, at sunset, with waves breaching the sea wall and gushing into the avenue. Probably you’ve seen it in movies, too—the now classic Buena Vista Social Club and more recent Fast & Furious 8 jump to mind. A Google search on “Havana’s seawall” results in dozen of pages and hundreds, if not thousands, of images of what has become the iconic symbol of Cuba, figuring large on travel websites, in music videos and fashion magazines, and on the cover of guidebooks. It’s to Havana what the Eiffel Tower is to Paris and the Empire State Building is to New York. Yet ask a Parisian the last time they visited the Eiffel Tower or a New Yorker the last time they went to the observation deck of the Empire State Building and the answer may be “never” or “the last time my relatives were in town.” While it’s logical that emblematic sites are co-opted for marketing hot travel destinations, the difference with the Malecón is that Cubans hang out, have parties, make music, fish, swim, and contemplate life there all the time (the other difference from the aforementioned sites is that the Malecón is free). As I type this, I guarantee a kid is doing a back flip into the waters below and a guy is baiting his hook somewhere along the eight miles of Havana’s seawall. Sometimes referred to as “the city’s sofa” because folks settle in so comfortably here on blistering summer nights, the Malecón holds such power over the Cuban psyche it is the first place emigres visit upon returning to the patria and the last place they go before moving overseas. This isn’t hyperbole: I’ve attended two going away parties on the Malecón in the past month.
So why such mystique around what is, when all is said and done, just a wall? What would drive Martha Gellhorn, former resident and wife of Ernest Hemingway, to grow weak in the knees after four decades away to write: “The first morning in Havana, I stood by the Malecón, feeling very weepy with homesickness for this city?” Why are there hundreds of people clustered together on the wall at the base of Vedado’s La Rampa every single night and still hundreds more spread out like birds on a wire east toward Habana Vieja and west toward Miramar? I’ve thought a lot about this because the Malecón’s allure has infected me too: when I’m away from Havana for a spell or sinking into that expat state of blue that comes on unexpectedly when you live long-term in a foreign country, I go to the seawall, kick off my shoes and lay back. The salty sea breeze and negative air ions are panacea for body and soul, that much is clear. And though there are parts that get crowded—especially in densely-populated sections of Vedado and Centro Habana—it’s one of the few places in Havana where Cubans can secure some privacy.
Havana hosts nearly 20 percent of the country’s population according to official statistics. But with 70 percent of the national economy based here, the figure is certainly higher since folks pour in from the drought-stricken, struggle-ridden provinces every day (despite laws controlling internal migration to the capital). On average, one building collapses in the city almost every day and existing housing stock, woefully inadequate and insufficient, is rapidly being converted into rental accommodation for tourists. All of these factors have created a housing crisis, what authorities categorize as one of the country’s biggest problems; it’s not uncommon for four generations to share a two-bedroom apartment, like my neighbors, or to squeeze half a dozen people into one-room solares (inner-city tenements, sometimes with shared kitchen and bathroom). On the Malecón, Cubans living in overcrowded and dilapidated housing can get away from a nagging mother-in-law, bickering parents, or their four mold-festering walls. Lovers can secret themselves (or not, a YouTube search will yield many videos of Cubans caught en flagrante) in darker sections for conjugal fun. Marriage proposals and first kisses, plans to flee and plots to swindle: it is all going down on the Malecón. There’s another simple, practical factor to the Malecon’s magnetism: temperatures are always cooler along the seawall. In a city where summer temperatures often top 100°F accompanied by stifling 100 percent humidity, and air conditioning is a luxury reserved for tourists and the well-to-do, spending an hour or two people watching with a few cold beers by the sea is pure survival tactic. As you may imagine, Cubans are proprietary about their patrimony, especially when it comes to the Malecón; if current rumors prove true that the new luxury hotel under construction where the Prado and seawall meet intends to appropriate part of the Malecón for the exclusive use of guests, things could get ugly.
THERE’S OFTEN CONFUSION ABOUT THE hotel scene in Cuba—what’s government owned, what’s a mixed venture, who runs what, how the profits are split—but about the Hotel Nacional, nothing is fuzzy: this is 100 percent Cuban-owned and operated and is a potent symbol of national sovereignty and pride. Designed by the New York firm of McKim, Meade and White (they of New York’s Penn Station and Columbia University), the Nacional opened in 1930 on a rocky outcrop overlooking the Malecón, and was long the preferred place to stay of the rich, famous and powerful. Winston Churchill, Frank Sinatra, and Jean-Paul Sartre all strode the marble and mahogany lobby here, making their way through the heavy doors to the tropical gardens, catching the sea breeze, a stiff rum cocktail at hand. Who didn’t stay here was Josephine Baker: the inimitable chanteuse was turned away for being black, whereupon she spun on her heels and checked into the Sevilla-Biltmore, holding a press conference in the spectacular lobby of that hotel, denouncing the Nacional’s racist policies. Other stars of sport, stage and screen turned away based on race include Jackie Robinson, Nat King Cole, and Joe Louis.
An all-time classic read, out of print but still available used, is Sartre on Cuba.
