@sainsburyb
AS HEAVY DROPS OF SALT-WATER HIT MY face, the distinctive aroma of tobacco leaf drifts from the houses opposite and with that of diesel fumes. A lone trumpeter sits on the seawall, unperturbed by the crashing waves, diligently practising arpeggios. I couldn’t be running anywhere in the world but Havana.
Buoyed by an unusual burst of early morning energy, I hasten steadily in the direction of the iconic Hotel Nacional de Cuba, my eyes fixed on the road ahead. In front of me the Malecón, Havana’s evocative 4.3-mile long sea drive, curls round the city’s northern shoreline in a protective embrace. Long a favoured meeting place for courting couples, wandering musicians, amateur fishers, daring divers, day-dreaming Floridagazers and assorted tourists in Che Guevara T-shirts, this is the city’s most expressive and typically Cuban thoroughfare. Local habaneros like to call it the world’s longest sofa, a potent slice of open-air theatre, where half the city shows up at sunset to meet, greet, date and debate.