Cuba holiday advice – avoid the rush

Cuba Advice: If you want to visit Cuba before it is overrun by tourists from the USA, you should go sooner rather than later.

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Last month we can reveal, American travel companies attended a US-Cuba Travel Summit in the Mexican resort of Cancun, where they discussed with Cuban tourism officials the opportunities and practicalities of offering holidays to Cuba.

The underlying assumption in the US, based on policy clues from President Obama, is not so much ‘if’ the 48-year-old ban on Americans travelling to the island will be lifted, as ‘when’.

The embargo on travel to and trade with Cuba, was first introduced in 1962 when Fidel Castro came to power.

Since then it has been repeatedly relaxed and reinforced by a succession of Democrat and Republican presidents, particularly for family visits.

A number of UK tour operators such as eBookers and Travelbag were forced to drop Cuba from their programmes because they had been bought by large American corporations such as Cendent and Sabre.

In April last year, just two months after President Obama took office, congressmen took their cue from the White House and began to talk openly about dropping travel restrictions (but perhaps not yet trade restrictions) and that possibility is now looking closer than ever.

According to Cuba’s tourism minister, Manuel Marrero, the island currently receives almost two and a half million tourists, of which the largest nationality are Canadians (0.9m). Already Cuba alone earns a fifth of the foreign exchange income coming into the Caribbean.

The Cubans now plan to expand resorts, airports and golf courses in anticipation of an influx of a million American holidaymakers a year…”when” the ban is lifted.