A Tour of Havana

If you ask any Habanero (resident of Havana) to identify the heart of the city, the unhesitating response will be"La Rampa." This bit of street in Vedado, stretching 500 metres down 23rd Avenue from the Coppelia Ice Cream Park to the sea, is the most central and bustling part of the capital. It's the ideal place for a walk, a romantic date, a work meeting, for distraction… and so, during the last 60 years La Rampa has become, along with the Malecón (seawall), the most cosmopolitan part of the metropolis.

There are many ways to experience Havana. One is to follow the historic footprints; another is to follow one's whim with pauses along the way wherever some place merits a stop. That's what we will be doing on these pages, with La Rampa as the starting point.


Different Styles
There is so much emphasis on the values of colonial Havana that there is the risk of assuming the rest of the city lacks them. Vedado is the best of modern Havana, an achievement of national city planning. With the establishment of the Republic in 1902, the district acquired unexpected prosperity as, besides being the site of the University, aristocrats and the nouveau riche had their residences built there.

The architecture's eclectic character achieved some of its best examples in mansions like those that today house the Cuban Union of Writers and Artists (corner of 17th and H), the Decorative Arts Museum (corner of 17th and E), and the Amadeo Roldán Auditorium on the corner of Calzada and D. Other buildings show a purer and more