
	Cuba A-Z

"Muévete a lo Cubano" - Salsa and more from March 31 to April 14, 2012
Experience Havana with experienced travel management!
Salsa, Movimiento, Reggaeton and on request extra modules like musical instruments, drums or Spanish classes

The centre of your journey "Muévete a lo Cubano" are two weeks of intensive Cuba experience. We will dance salsa and go out to eat or dance together. We will meet Cubans who will tell us about their lives. We wil get to know Havana and travel to the beach. You decide about the events you want to participate in. Apart from the basic offer you can also expand your program by additional courses if you like.

Because Cuba wouldn't be Cuba without salsa our journey includes intensive Salsa dancing, and the body is specifically prepared for the movement dynamics of Latin American dances. The methodology of individual learning within a group developed especially by "Danza y Movimiento" makes this offer suitable for both beginners and advanced dancers. The Salsa classes give you an individual learning guideline, which allows you to advance together with your Cuban dance partner according to your own speed. Movimiento, the class for salsa-isolation-techniques, gives you a basic repertoire for all Caribbean dances from salsa to Reggaeton. This preparation of dance techniques is important, because Salsa doesn't become accessible by merely practising step combinations and figures, but due to the security you have when working with your own body. The salsa classes are rounded off by the typically Cuban Rueda in which the dancers move in a circle and change partners constantly.

We stay at carefully selected Casas Particulares. This is the Cuban form of "bed and breakfast". Apart from the fact that the houses chosen by us equal the standard of a Cuban 3* hotel, this contact with Cubans offers you the unique opportunity to experience Cuba unfiltered. This doesn't mean that we couldn't also make you an offer with accommodation in a hotel... In any case, the participants of the workshops stay close to each other. Thus, there is also the possibility to meet with the others. If you book as a person travelling alone and prefer to be accommodated in more sociable way, you can also choose the option "double room" and avoid the single room additional costs at the same time. For more information, please have a look at the bottom of this page.

Holidays, relaxation and the encounter with Cuban everyday life are central topics of this journey. Apart from the dancing in the afternoon and the group activities, we will get to know Havana on a guided tour. A day trip takes you to the beaches of Playas del Este - palmtrees, white beaches, the turquoise sea... And there is plenty of free time at your disposal for undertakings on your own or with the group.

An experienced English-speaking tour management will join you on this journey. And, of course, you receive valuable advice for dancing, strolling and excursions.

The dance classes are arranged by Caruca and her team. For more information on Caruca and Salsa, please click here.

And if you would like to know about the impressions of participants of similar group journeys you can read their feedbacks here.

Travel dates: March 31 to April 14, 2012

The basic price for our journey staying in a double room in a Casa Particular (private accommodation), is (per person)

1149.- Euro

Arrival: 31/03/2012
Start of programme: 01/04/ Sunday, 10am (city tour)
Departure: 14/04/

If you should not have a flight yet, you can also book the program and make sure that you receive this price by paying a deposit - even without definite flight dates.

Included in the price of this group journey offer(if not indicated differently):

Individual airport transfer on arrival and departure
Accommodation (14 nights including breakfast)
City tour showing you the old part of Havana
Day trip to the beaches of Playas del Este
10 x 120min Salsa with individual Cuban dance partner (DyM - methodology)
10 x 90min Movimiento (Isolation training)
Possibilities to eat and dance together (costs involved are not included in the price)
two CDs with Cuban music for your travel preparations (will be sent together with your travel documents)
On request, Salsa-certificate for successful participation in the course
Tour management English/Spanish

Extra modules for the completion of the basic program:

Spanish training (20hrs for 165.- Euro)
Drumming (5 x 90min for 180.- Euro)
Musical instruments (on request)

Please read the following details attentively, because they include more information on the journey:

Single room additional costs for a Casa Particular: 220.- Euro.
Single travellers can choose the option "double room" when booking. You pay the single room price first, but we will refund you 12.- per night shortly after the journey when sharing the room with another person of the group.
On request, we can also calculate an individual offer for the program staying at any other hotel in Havana preferred by you.
Getting there: Individual and not included in the price. On request, we can give you the contact information of an experienced agency for flights from our network.
The city tour is in English.
Do you want to travel with your children? Cuba likes children... We organise special offers for children or teenagers and also for younger children.
For bookings and enquiries, please use our form.
We will confirm your application by email. You receive a written travel confirmation/invoice by mail or as a pdf-document by email after all the services included are confirmed. Deviating from our General Terms, the deposit for this journey is 250.- Euro per person. Another 250.- Euro have to be paid 90 days prior to the start of your journey. Please pay the rest of the invoice amount 30 days prior to the start of your journey. In case of the cancellation of your journey, the following amounts have to be paid per person: Up to 90 days prior to the start of your journey: 250.- Euro, up to 30 days prior to the start of your journey: 500.- Euro, starting from the 29th to the 15th day prior to the start of your journey: 60% of the travelprice. Starting from the 14th day prior to the start of your journey the information published in our general terms are valid. If you don't live in the EU or the UK and the payment is made by credit card, we will charge your credit card account with the corresponding amounts.
We recommend to take out a travel cancellation insurance policy or other travel insurance policies.
If your arrival or departure dates should vary due to flight schedules, or if you simply wish to arrive earlier or to stay longer, we calculate the extra nights/ services separately.
If you have the time and if you would like to spend a week close to Havana at the Playas del Este prior to our program or after the program, we can recommend and organise private accommodations as well as various hotels. 7 nights in a double room including breakfast starts from 200 Euro per person. (This offer is only valid in combination with the booking of the basic package.)
Please do not forget to tell us about your previous Salsa knowledge when booking.
Minimum number of participants for the program as described above: 6. If there should be less bookings, we will still offer the alternative programme "Salsa und Movimiento".

For more information on the content of the journey or the travel management, please contact us by using our contact page. If the travel dates of this journey should not suit you, please note that we offer Salsa courses in small groups throughout the year! You can get more information here.

This is what participants of the salsa group journeys according to the DyM method told us afterwards

Dorit from Austria

I enjoyed the journey a lot – first of all I chose DyM because it appeared the most personal of all the travel organisers, and it met my expectations. The combination of private accommodation and dancing in a small group and also the possibility to go to the beach was great to me.

Thomas W. writes:

Hello Matthias, as you already know, it took me some effort to convince my girlfriend to book this journey. But the "effort" has not only been worthwhile for myself. She enjoyed Cuba as much as I did. This was my most beautiful vacation so far.

I think the main reason for this was the group journey, the group. To me (us), not speaking Spanish very fluently, it also made things easier. The voluntary (evening) events were also nice, they always kept us busy. During the whole time, we only made it to the beach twice, and this is talking about a beach fanatic like myself... I didn't even miss it!

How can one describe this journey to somebody else, well, I will try: Cuba is poor, the people don't have anything. The houses are run-down and the meals nothing to write home about. I think, everybody should know that. I learned for myself that we can be quite happy here in Germany and that the world is somehow distorted. People in Cuba are always happy, singing, dancing and laughing. We Germans are always complaining about something. We are really too well off and / or we don't do it right.

So much about the background. Now, I am getting to the real purpose of my (our) travel, the music and the dancing. Apparently, this journey was heaven on earth for me. It is incredible how the Cubans move and what sort of occasions can make you dance. I am only thinking about our day trip to the beach at the weekend... The dancing during Caruca's classes is sudorific and, without exaggeration - a mere drill. But it was also lots of fun, and who else has the opportunity to dance and practise for 20 hours with the best Cuban dancers?

Ralph from Zurich

The two weeks were more than great, the first time after a holiday I WASN'T looking forward to returning home/ to Switzerland!

Karl R. writes:

Cuba has thrown me out of my everyday routine quite a bit, and it will probably take some time to adjust again, especially now, as it has become so cold again, I would like to stumble towards a mojito service station at 5.30pm with a steaming soul and a t-shirt ready to be wrought out, to sit dizzily at the Malecon without knowing if even a single step will work, if the women wouldn't lead us so wonderfully through the labyrinth of setenta y unos or dos, well, all gone, now we have to be real men again and lead ourselves or not, but everything has gone back to normal too quickly or it should be and one rather functions a bit Cuban here, thus with an enormous diesel consumption, and so it is a bit too early for a résumé, especially for a definitive one: in any case this has been a unique vacation, hard to compare to anything else and thank you very much.

Georg S. writes:

first of all I would like to thank you for the organisation and the tour guidance in Havana. I couldn't tell you personally, because I didn't meet you on my departure day, Friday. I hope the final night was as good as the 14 days before; I would have really liked to be there. The time in Cuba was very beautiful for me: with lots of impressions and experiences. But I also returned thoughtfully: some things and some people I only started to understand bit by bit towards the end of the journey. It is an island one probably begins to understand when going there the second time. But there is something fascinating, I cannot say what it is. I think I wasn't there for the last time.
I especially liked that we had the chance to get to know a lot of people, also Cubans, in an extremely short period of time. Of course, not all of them were "friends", "true friends" but still... I prefer it this way when visiting a new country. This begins with the accommodation (even if I had some problems in the beginning and if I would have preferred it differently) and it ends with the dance course and our Cuban dance partners. I also liked our travel group and I will probably meet one or the other here. The drum classes with Ruy were lots of fun; he is a very good musician and a good teacher at the same time, which is not always the case. In fact, the dance course was were demanding physically, but just great. It was lots of fun give full power! The Caruca is pure energy and she is doing a very good job, even if she demanded a lot from us; I was very lucky with my two main dance partners: they were very patient with me being a total beginner at Salsa dancing. When they weren't there one day, I noticed the difference very clearly. Now I have to find out if I am actually able to lead myself. But in any case I will stick to the new achievement of Salsa dancing!
The excursions with Yvonne and Gladys were also very good: I especially remember the visit to the conservatory and the introduction to the Santeria religion: unfortunately I couldn't accept the Babalao's offer of a future co-operation: despite the internet and similar things!?
One has to get used to the music and dance events sometimes (noise and procedure, especially in the Casa de la Musica), even if it wasn't the first contact with similar circumstances (Brazil), but also there, I enjoyed the informality between locals and tourists. To me, the journey already included many prior arrangements, thus there wasn't a lot of time to see a bit more than just the city, but I was aware of that and it requires another trip to Cuba!
After all, an overall interesting vacation!

Angelika L. has used our feedback form ...

1. All in all, my journey was
( x ) very good

2. Concerning the services booked with Danza y Movimiento I was
( x ) very content

2.1 Accommodation
( x ) good

2.2 Course(s) booked
( x ) very good (Spanish)
( x ) good (Salsa)

4. My expectations:
( x ) What I experienced, exceeded my expectations.

... and Julia L. as well:

1. All in all, my journey
( x) very good

2. Concerning the services booked with Danza y Movimiento I was
( x ) very content

2.1 Accommodation
( x ) very good
The family was extremely nice. I have learned a lot about Cuba because of this close contact. The breakfast was excellent.

2.2 Course(s) booked
(x ) very good
Caruca was an outstanding teacher, The dance partners led very well.

2.3 Other services worth mentioning
City tour, day trip to the beach
( x ) very good

4. My expectations:.
( x ) What I experienced, exceeded my expectations.

I am still thinking a lot about Cuba. It was an especially nice and intensive holiday!

Jsabelle W. writes:

well, the Salsa journey took place a while ago, but I am still thinking a lot about it. Beforehand, I had prepared myself with books and movies in order not to get a shock there. But I noticed that all the preparation is not useful , because this country is just too special to be described in books. I had had the expectation to meet Cubans in their normal lives, but I had to experience that it is not easy at all to get hold of any serious Cubans. I would like to travel to Cuba again in order to rise to this challenge, but I am convinced that it would take at least a month to really get to know this island. Even if I spent a weekend in the country, this visit was too short to be able to say that I got to know Cuba. On every street corner, I was challenged to deal with the Cubans. I was often struck by the rip-off mentality, and often, I didn't manage to keep away from these situations. On a different journey, I would mainly go to smaller towns, because I am sure that it would be easier to get contact with the people without having to be cautious all the time in order to avoid rip-offs. But as to Salsa dancing it was definitely worthwhile staying in the capital of 3 million. I had also had great expectations about being able to get the maximum profit out of the 2 weeks, and my expectations were actually exceeded. The dance school was super, and I learned a lot of new things.

"Muévete a lo Cubano" - Salsa and more from March 31 to April 14, 2012 Experience Havana with experienced travel management! Salsa, Movimiento, Reggaeton and on request extra modules like musical instruments, drums or Spanish classes

1149.- Euro

This is what participants of the salsa group journeys according to the DyM method told us afterwards

"Muévete a lo Cubano" - Salsa and more from March 31 to April 14, 2012
Experience Havana with experienced travel management!
Salsa, Movimiento, Reggaeton and on request extra modules like musical instruments, drums or Spanish classes