Major Tourist Attractions In Santiago de Cuba

Bacardi Museum

Bacardi, the world’s largest privately held, family-owned spirits company, started producing rum in Santiago way back in 1862. The family fled Cuba after the revolution in 1959 although the company's current production sales exceed 240 million bottles a year in 170 countries. Emilio Bacardi’s private art and antique collection is still in Santiago as is the original family rum distillery. It was the fruit bats that nested in the rafters of the original rum factory that gave Bacardi rum its world-famous bat logo.

Castillo de San Pedro del Morro (Morro Castle)

Santiago's most impressive structure is poised ominously atop the cliffs at the narrow entrance to Santiago Bay, about nine miles (14km) south of Santiago. This enormous piece of military architecture - a maze of stairways and dungeons - was begun in 1640. The Morro was rebuilt in 1664 after the English pirate, Henry Morgan, reduced it to rubble. The castle now houses the Museum of Piracy, featuring excellent displays on piracy, colonialism, and slavery. There are old blunderbusses, muskets, cutlasses and Toldeo blades in glass cases.

Moncada Barracks

The bullet-ridden barracks and adjacent Parque Historico Abel Santamaria were part of important events in Cuba's history. In 1953 a group led by Fidel Castro attacked the barracks in an attempt to steal weapons and launch the revolution, but the plan failed and 61 of them were killed. The rest were captured and many tortured to death by Batista's army. Fidel was later tried in the Escuela de Enfermeras for leading the attack and is where he made his famous 'History Will Absolve Me' speech.

Santa Ifigenia Cemetery

The gateway to this cemetery is dominated by a memorial to Cuban soldiers who died fighting in Angola. From here the visitor is led to the impressive tomb of Cuban national hero, revolutionary and writer Jose Marti. The tomb is in the form of a crenulated hexagonal tower with each side representing one of Cuba’s six original provinces. The round mausoleum is designed so that the sun will always shine on Marti’s casket, which is draped with the Cuban flag. The cemetery also contains a shrine to the Virgin of Charity, Cuba’s patron saint, in the form of the Basilica del Cobre. This little church is said to be the scene of miracles performed by the saint.