Niceto Pérez is a rural municipality in the hills just west of the city of Guantánamo, in the far east of Cuba, a region of sugar cane, small farms and mountains rising towards the Sierra Maestra and the coffee country of the Gran Piedra. It is not a place that features in many guidebooks, and that is part of its interest. The surrounding hills hold the remains of the coffee plantations established in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries by French planters fleeing the revolution in Saint-Domingue, now Haiti, and the archaeological landscape of those first coffee plantations in the south east of Cuba is listed by UNESCO.
The French brought with them knowledge, capital and enslaved Africans, and they built a remarkable system of terraced plantations, drying platforms, aqueducts and houses on the steep slopes of the eastern mountains. Many of the plantations were abandoned in the nineteenth century, and their ruins now lie hidden in the forest, slowly being reclaimed by nature. The most famous, the Cafetal La Isabelica, near the Gran Piedra above Santiago de Cuba, has been restored as a museum.
Guantánamo, about twelve kilometres away, is the main city of the province, with a population of more than two hundred thousand. It gave its name to one of the most famous Cuban songs, Guantanamera, and it is the birthplace of changüí, a style of music that is a forerunner of son and salsa. The nearby American naval base, at the bay of Guantánamo, is off limits, but there are viewpoints from which you can see it in the distance.
Riding in eastern Cuba is an adventure. The roads vary from reasonable to very poor, with potholes, broken surfaces and unexpected obstacles, including horse-drawn carts, cyclists, pedestrians and livestock. Fuel can be hard to find, with shortages common in recent years, so fill up whenever you can and carry spare fuel if possible. The heat and humidity are intense, especially in summer, and the hurricane season runs from June to November. Water and food supplies are limited in rural areas, so plan carefully, carry supplies, and ask local people for advice. Their hospitality is one of the great rewards of travelling in Cuba.