Finca Vigia. Hemingway’s House in Cuba

Hemingway’s house in Cuba was built in 1886 bt the Catalan architect Miguel Pascual y Baguer on a hill 20 km away east of  Havanа. The biography of the famous American author is quite interesting. He is the creator of “The Old Man and the Sea” but he was also a boxer, a journalist, a hunter, a military correspondent, and an ambulance driver. According to some of the sources as a military correspondent he has worked with spies – this explains his close relations with Mussolini and other famous politicians. Mussolini even gave Hemingway as a present for his house works of art by Picasso. Ernest Hemingway is a winner of the Nobel Prize for literature /1954/and the Pulitzer prize in 1953 for his novel “The Old Man and the Sea”. The prototype of the old man was a fisherman from the Cohimar neighbourhood located 18 km from Havanа. There you will also find the restaurant with the author’s favourite table which a tourirst site in the capital suburb. I don’t recommend visiting the restaurant since food there is nothing special and the prizes are too high. If you are fans of Hemingway you can visit his other house and a museum in Key West.

In Hemingway’s mansion, you will see his house the way he leaves it before departing in 1961 – his typing machine where he used to create his novels, his trophies from Africa, paintings, and others. His yacht is displayed on his tennis pitch. The graves of his four beloved dogs are kept in the yard.

Hemigway's boat

Hemingway’s boat

The mansion was rented by Hemingway, but he fell in love with the place so much /maybe because of the climate/ that e buys it for 19 000 USD. A legend has it that 2000 mulatto women used to indulge in the view from the three-floor tower of the mansion.

 The tower reveals a breathtaking view of Havanа. He used to loch himself there and study Italian with his 19-year-old assistant to the horror of his fourth and last wife Mary.

Hemingway took his inspiration from Mark Twain, John Dan, Mopasan, Shakespeare, Mozart, Dostoevsky, Stendal, Bah, Turgenev, Tolstoy, and many other authors and artists. He used to own a big collection of books. He experienced a lot in a lifetime – he was in car and plane crashes, he was injured by a lion and bit by a shark, he fell from a horse and suffered brain concussions, he had malaria, skin cancer, pneumonia, diabetes, a torn kidney and spleen, and a skull fracture.

Hemingway used to love Cuba unconditionally. Cuba, on its part, returns the favour by immortalizing all the places he had lived or loved as historical sites. Some of these places are the Bodegida del Medio, La Floridita, and the Ambus Mundos Hotel in Havana. These sites are always full of tourists and are a must for my groups.

On the 2nd of July 1961, Hemingway commits suicide, which turns out to be family damnation since the same happened to his father, his little brother, and even his granddaughter. One of Hemingway’s most notable quotes during his active years is: “I like life so much. It would be difficult when the time comes to kill myself”.

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