Santiago de Cuba

The first settlement was founded on here site in 1515 by Diego Velázquez. The new city – it was immediately given the status of the capital – has flourished thanks to the port trade and the copper mines of El Cobre, located near the city. Santiago remained as a main city of the country until 1553 (when Havana was declared as a capital).

Santiago is a city of broad avenues, quiet squares and museums. Its historical center – an Old City – downs to the harbor with rectangular blocks. The echo of a bygone era lives in its narrow streets with dilapidated houses of pastel houses.

Today in the industrial port of Santiago the Caribbean influence is much clearer than in the capital of the country. The city has always maintained close ties with Santo Domingo and Jamaica. Thousands of English and French-speaking immigrants who came here for three hundred years have contributed to the creation of motley quilt of local culture.

The city has many interesting museums, including such well-known as located in an old mansion the Ethnographic Museum "La Isabelika", the palace of the first Cuban conquistador Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, built in the years 1516-1520 (now the Museum of Colonial Art), Municipal museum named by Emilio Bacardi, the Historical Museum in the famous Moncada barracks, the museum-estate Siboney (the house, where Castro's revolutionaries gathered in 1953), the Museum of Natural History. There is the fortress of San Pedro de la Roca near the town; it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Two theaters, a picturesque city cathedral, conservatory, university, many cinemas and other places are worth of interest too. The village of El Cobre is the place of pilgrimage, here in 1831 the Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin of Mercy Cobre – Cuba's patron saint – was built.