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Commandancia de la Plata is the revolutionary headquarters of the rebel army which was headed by Fidel Castro and Che Guevara back in the 1950s. The area was chosen for its remoteness and everything was built so that it could not be seen from the air therefore protecting the rebel base from detection and air raids. The trek starts an hour outside Bayamo in the Sierra Maestra mountain range, the highest in Cuba, and to be honest it was a pretty easy 3km trek except for the huge amount of mud which made it all a little dirty and precarious. We also stumbled over a few snakes along the path but managed to avoid any trouble. The drive up to the start point in a 4wd taxi was a little interesting as well as we tackled slopes of about 50° - but hey it was 5km uphill that we didn´t have to walk!
All of the buildings in the base have been preserved and we spent an hour wandering around them all. They were all designed with the least amount of change to the area so they are built with trees as part of their walls, many of them are built on stilts and the ground isn´t even level inside the buildings. The hospital building that was used by Che was particularly small and the ground is on a serious slope, I cant imagine what kind of medical treatments they were able to do in there!
The idea was that if they needed to change the location of the base they could dismantle everything and leave the area with only a tiny trace that they had ever been there.
Fidels house was the most extravagant of the buildings, with no doors and just concealed wooden panels that served as windows allowing entry and exit as well as a trap door in the floor to allow Fidel to get away quickly if needed. The tree beside his house is riddled with bullet holes as apparently this is where he used to practise shooting and try out all the new arms.
Another place of interest was the building in which Radio Rebelda was set up near the top of the hill. The original equipment that Che and others used to stay in contact with their fellows involved in the revolution. We were shown the antenna that was able to be put up and dismantled, but only at night to prevent unwanted attention.
Commandancia de la Plata was the only reason for us to go to Bayamo but as the trek turned out to be one of the high points of our Cuban trip it was definitely worth the diversion.
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