We went, as luck would have it, in 2003 just before the Bush administration really cracked down on American travel to Cuba. Flew to Havana, rented a car, and hit the road for a week. There are only a couple of road signs in Cuba, and not on the roads we took. But people were very friendly. We started to pick up hitchhikers, a fine way to meet Cubans. Havana is, or was, a lovely city, crumbling around its citizens as they scrabble for a living in buildings that are turning to dust around them.