A video published on Facebook shows the current state of the Gran Hotel Balneario San Miguel de los Baños in Matanzas, a Renaissance-style building with columns, domes, and balustrades that is falling apart after decades of neglect under the Cuban regime.
The images, captured by Roberto Ernesto Pérez Pedroza, closely traverse the facade of the building: walls stained with dampness, crumbling stucco, windows without glass, and vegetation encroaching upon the rubble. The title of the video says it all: "The Hotel Up Close."
The Grand Spa Hotel was built in 1929 at the initiative of Dr. Manuel Abril Ochoa, with the advice of engineer Alfredo Colley, who had been involved in the construction of the Monte Carlo Spa in Italy.
Inaugurated in 1930, it was the first hydro-mineral and climate therapy station in Latin America and was known as the "Paradise of Cuba."
The complex, with three floors and four domes, welcomed Cuban and foreign tourists, prominent figures from science and politics, and hosted nationally and internationally significant conferences.
Its mineral waters, containing 60% minerals, colloidal sulfur, and radioactive and alkaline properties, have been scientifically confirmed since 1868.
After 1959, the hotel was nationalized. It operated only as a restaurant until 1968, briefly reopened in 1979, and closed permanently in 1995 due to deterioration caused by intensive use and a complete lack of maintenance.
Since then, according to those who knew him, he is an anachronistic shell looted during the Special Period.
In 2001, the Cuban government declared it a National Monument. The title did not help: the building continued to sink without effective intervention. In July 2023, residents of San Miguel de los Baños publicly demanded its repair. No progress has been reported.
The comments on the video are a collective condemnation. "The San Miguel Beach Resort, how beautiful it was; isn't it true that communism destroys everything? What a horror," wrote an internet user. Another recalled: "I also had the privilege of sleeping, eating, and spending beautiful days in that hotel. It's incredible how everything is destroyed in the claws of murderous communism."
A user who visited it as a child wrote: "It still retains its beauty and resists destruction; there are many speculations about why it was abandoned, but none, in my opinion, support the credibility of such a sensitive loss."
Another comment pointed directly at the nationalizations: "They have allowed everything related to the properties taken from successful entrepreneurs in Cuba decades ago to be destroyed. They have only been concerned with plundering for their personal gain."
The pattern repeats throughout the Island. The Marianao Racetrack closed in 1967. The Los Siboneyes restaurant in La Lisa is in ruins. The Havana Club nightclub at the Comodoro Hotel has been in total abandonment for years.
All beautiful and profitable facilities left to deteriorate after being taken from private hands.
"Cuba is one of the few countries, if not the only one, that allows itself the luxury of losing these wonders," summarized an internet user. "Our country will never recover those jewels that are lost day by day."
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