{"id":42566,"date":"2016-04-13T00:00:01","date_gmt":"2016-04-13T00:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGAR2020\/?p=42566"},"modified":"2016-04-13T00:00:01","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T00:00:01","slug":"classic-cars-of-cuba-observations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/classic-cars-of-cuba-observations\/","title":{"rendered":"Classic Cars of Cuba \u2013 Observations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGAR2020\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/Kress_Cuba_1-250x187-1.jpg\" alt=\"Classic Cars of Cuba \u2013 Observations\" width=\"250\" height=\"187\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-42567\" \/>I went to Cuba for a two week vacation in February of 2015. I went because it is warm there and it is very cold in Pittsburgh at that time of year. That is not the only reason, but it was the main reason.<\/p>\n<p>As I get older, it seems that I am unable to take the cold like I did when I was younger. Now I know you Canadians can go to Cuba anytime you want, but it is different for us Americans. It is kind of like the fruit of the forbidden tree. Bonnie and I went with a travel company that has some kind of exemption to the travel ban for educational reasons.<\/p>\n<p>During the visit, we met with representatives of the Cuban government to talk about the relations between America and Cuba. (Remember this was pre-President Obama\u2019s visit). I learned things about the embargo that I did not know before. For instance, if a foreign ship docks in a Cuban port, it is not allowed into an American port for a period of six months. If a corporation does business with Cuba, they are not allowed to do business in the US.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGAR2020\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/08\/Kress_Cuba_8.jpg\" alt=\"Classic Cars of Cuba \u2013 Observations\" width=\"250\" height=\"187\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-42568\" \/>That is why there are no new foreign cars in Cuba except Russian ones. If Toyota sold cars in Cuba, America would not let them sell cars here. That is why you see all the old American cars still running in Cuba. We had a chance to ride in a few and to talk to the drivers and owners. Our guide told us that Cuban mechanics are also known as \u201cmagicians\u201d. They have changed the drive train in a lot of these cars to diesel engines. We went to dinner one night in a 1947 Chevrolet that was given to the driver to take care of when the owner left Cuba after the revolution. The original owner died, and now the car belongs to the driver. At least he thought so.<\/p>\n<p>I was told that there is a MGA in Cuba. Tim Coyne, past NAMGAR Chairman, even took some parts to him for his car some years ago. Randy Grossman, our Advertising Manager, wanted me to find the owner but I was unable to make contact. After I got home, I saw that Barney Gaylord has a lot of information of the owner on his MGA Guru website.<\/p>\n<p>Cuba was an interesting trip. The people were all glad to see you, and it was warm there in February. The main reason I went!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I went to Cuba for a two week vacation in February of 2015. I went<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44424,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-namgar-member-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42566\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/namgar.com\/NAMGARMAIN\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}