CU oriente history tour
9 Dec 2001

SIERRA MAESTRA, Cuba - (Reuters) - Nowhere is the romance of the 1959 Cuban Revolution better encapsulated than in the rugged Sierra Maestra mountains where young rebel leader Fidel Castro and his bearded followers made their hideout. Virtually unchanged since those heady days, the Sierra Maestra's remote slopes and forests -- enclosing Cuba's best wildlife -- are today obligatory trekking ground for visitors eager to explore the Caribbean island's political heritage. The most hallowed turf for Castro sympathizers is ''Comandancia La Plata'': a few camouflaged huts and shelters on a barely accessible hillside where he kept his military headquarters hidden from the army of former dictator Fulgencio Batista. On a recent trip, visitors were allowed into the hut where Castro lived, even sitting on his large bed next to a window overlooking the surrounding undergrowth. Adding a touch of authenticity, a 1950s American fridge stands in the main room with a bullet hole where it was hit by enemy fire while being carried up the mountains to the ``Commandante's'' hut. Visitors, who hike up to La Plata along a windy path with stunning views, can also see the trap door where Castro would have sought to escape had Batista's men found him. Close by stands the table used by another revolutionary heroine, Celia Sanchez, a close companion of Castro until her death in 1980, to take down his orders and letters, and screen visitors. Elsewhere in La Plata is a hut called ``The Press House'' where the always image-conscious Castro would receive rebel-escorted journalists for crucial interviews proving he was alive and well after Batista-controlled media said he was dead. ``One time a journalist came who aroused Fidel's suspicions, so when he left he ordered the hut covered with leaves and branches,'' a guide said. ``Sure enough, he was a spy and the next day a plane came over looking for the rebels, but thanks to Fidel's precautions, they couldn't find them.'' Although views on Castro and the communist path later taken by his revolution differ widely now, his two-year guerrilla war and triumph on Jan. 1, 1959, initially captured the imagination of many around the world and won strong support in Cuba. Having been attacked while landing at Cuba's southeastern coast on Dec. 2, 1956, survivors of Castro's 82-member invasion force took immediately to the Sierra Maestra with only five guns between them, according to their version. But after escaping a manhunt and ensconcing themselves in the mountains, the rebels built up close relationships with local peasant farmers and their numbers slowly grew to about 300. ``One got a feeling he is now invincible,'' wrote Herbert Matthews, of the New York Times, whose exclusive reports after a visit to the Sierra played an important part in the romantic aura surrounding Castro's fledgling army. Stealing weapons from Batista troops during a series of skirmishes around the region, the rebel army gradually became better equipped. Even as late as May 1958, though, Batista thought he could rid himself of the troublesome rebels with a massive offensive of 10,000 soldiers encircling the mountains. But after that failed, the balance turned. With army morale low, popular sentiment in favor of Castro, and urban support increasingly effective, the rebels advanced across the country and Batista fled to the Dominican Republic on New Year's Day. Visitors wanting to hear how it all happened would do well to stop off at Santo Domingo, a village on the northern side of the Sierra Maestra, a few miles down from La Plata. There, the now elderly musicians from the ``Quinteto Rebelde'' (Rebel Quintet) -- a band that played on Castro's clandestine ``Radio Rebelde'' (''Rebel Radio'') -- offer one of the liveliest first-hand accounts of the Sierra Maestra war. The group accompanied the rebels in the mountains, writing special songs to satirize the enemy like ``Go away, monkey!'' and others to extoll Castro, Argentine-born guerrilla Ernesto ``Che'' Guevara and the rest of the guerrillas like ``Let's protect Fidel'', ``I'm a Fidelista'' or ``Respect 'Che' Guevara''. ``We encouraged the rebels and demoralized Batista's army ... creating allegoric songs offending the tyrant's soldiers,'' said singer and guitar player Alejandro Medina Munoz, 62. Those songs, and other Radio Rebelde news bulletins and propaganda, played a crucial part in the conflict, as the station was heard across Cuba and as far away as Venezuela and Central America due to its high position on the mountains. Hidden in a tunnel, the Radio Rebelde equipment was sometimes taken out for use in battle, with music and slogans blaring out as the rebels attacked the Batista soldiers. ``Imagine what it's like during combat to hear music come back at you as you fire shots?'' Medina said. ``Many of them, when we took them prisoner, said they couldn't tell where they were, at home, in a party or whatever!'' Medina, one of 10 children of a peasant farmer in the Sierra, and four other members, have now regrouped the Quinteto Rebelde to play for tourists at a small hotel in Santo Domingo. The most hardy tourists, and many young Cubans on a ritual political pilgrimage encouraged by authorities seeking to imbue them with revolutionary spirit, make the tough, normally 2-day hike up the Sierra's and Cuba's highest peak, Pico Turquino, which rises about 6,000 feet. There, Castro was caught in a famous black-and-white picture of the era holding a rifle as he stood imperiously looking over the country he was about to conquer -- and still rules nearly 43 years later. Although the Sierra Maestra is gradually opening up for tourism, gaining permission to climb Turquino, and visit La Plata, is still sometimes difficult due to official sensibilities and renovation work to trails and installations. Organizational lapses should be expected, too. This reporter spent a night on the floor half-way up to Turquino after bedding supposed to be brought up by mules never arrived. At the bottom of the Sierra Maestra lies what Cuba's government calls the ``Heroic City'' of Santiago de Cuba: the island's second largest city, the first major center occupied by the rebels, and also the scene of Castro's first armed action with a failed 1953 attack on an army garrison. Santiago de Cuba is also a must on the revolutionary tourism trail, particularly the Moncada Barracks, which is now a museum and school. About half of the assailants were caught, tortured and executed by the army after Castro's disastrous attempt to besiege the garrison on July 26, 1953, with a motley collection of old cars and hunting guns. In the first of many strokes of luck, Castro survived after being caught by a sympathetic army officer who disobeyed secret orders to kill him and took him to jail instead. ``This young lawyer is the one accused of running the tragic and crazy attack on the Moncada Barracks,'' local newspaper Oriente wrote at the time in its coverage of the trial against Castro where he famously declared: ``History will absolve me.'' Both Moncada, and ``La Granjita de Siboney'' (The Little Farmhouse in Siboney) from where the rebels set out, are now political shrines in Cuba's revolutionary heartland. A journey between the two passes monuments to the 55 assailants who died during or after the attack. At the Granjita, visitors can see the well where Castro's band hid their weapons and the chicken-roosts where they kept the cars. Back in Santiago, another obligatory stop is the balcony where Castro addressed the masses on his entry into the city after the triumph of the revolution. Forty years later, on Jan. 1, 1999, Castro was back on the same balcony reminding the world that the man who led the most famous guerrilla war in 20th century Latin America was still going strong on the eve of the 21st century. ``What Fidel did should never be forgotten. It's good for everyone to see all this and remember,'' said a former member of his army in the Sierra, Rolando Salas, who is now driving tourists round the area in a 1957 Chevrolet.