ON THE WAY TO VERACRUZ

As we drive south from Costa Esmeralda the landscape becomes much more tropical, and often reminds me of vistas of the Cuban countryside. I even saw a "campesino" in the traditional white garb consisting of a loose white cotton shirt and loose pants and sandals plus a straw hat. The cloth is coarse and unrefined, but it is suitable to the heavy work and intense heat of his occupation. It looked like a picture from the past. Unfortunately I did not get his picture. That seemed to be a clear throwback to Spanish Colonial garbs also used in Cuba.
This is sugar cane, pineapple, and banana country. We found large sugar cane plantations being harvested in the traditional way: first scorch the leafy parts of the sugar cane with a field fire, then go in with a crew of machete wielding campesinos and load the sugar cane stalks by hand on trucks that take their load to the "ingenios' or cane sugar refining plants nearby.

The only difference between that picture and that in my mind from old Cuba is the use of trucks instead of ox drawn carts. and cargo trains.
Above is a heavily laden truck with sugar cane.
A hardware store named "Ronzon"
The burro is a main means of transportation. You often see them tied to the roadside grazing.