Cienfuegos, Cuba

History | Geography | Sports | Attractions | Transportation

🇨🇺 Cienfuegos, capital of Cienfuegos Province, is a city on the southern coast of Cuba. It is located about 250 km from Havana. Since the late 1960s, Cienfuegos has become one of Cuba's main industrial centres, especially in the energy and sugar sectors. The city is dubbed La Perla del Sur. Although Cienfuegos literally translates to "one hundred fires", the city takes its name from the surname of José Cienfuegos, Captain General of Cuba.

In 2005, UNESCO inscribed the Urban Historic Centre of Cienfuegos on the World Heritage List, citing Cienfuegos as the best extant example of early 19th century Spanish Enlightenment implementation in urban planning. The downtown area contains six buildings from 1819–50, 327 buildings from 1851–1900, and 1188 buildings from the 20th century. There is no other place in the Caribbean which contains such a remarkable cluster of Neoclassical structures.

History The area where the city lies was identified as Cacicazgo de Jagua by early Spanish conquistadors. It was originally settled by Taino indigenous people. Cacicazgo translates from the Taino language as "chiefdom". Cacicazgo de Jagua was therefore the chiefdom of Chief Jagua.

The city was later settled by French immigrants from Bordeaux and Louisiana led by Don Louis de Clouet on April 22, 1819. The settlers named the city Fernandina de Jagua in honor of King Ferdinand VII of Spain and Chief Jagua. The settlement successively became a town (villa) in 1829, renamed for José Cienfuegos, Captain General of Cuba (1816–19), and a city in 1880. Many of the streets in old town reflect French origins in their names: Bouyón, D'Clouet, Hourruitiner, Gacel, and Griffo, for instance.

Cienfuegos port, despite being one of the latest settlements established during the colonial era, soon grew to be a powerful town due to the fertile fields surrounding it and its position on the trade route between Jamaica and South American cities to the south-east and the hinterland provincial capital of Santa Clara to the northeast. Its advantageous trading location on the historically eponymous Bay of Jagua was used by the Cuban sugar oligarchy when a railroad was built between both cities between 1853 and 1860.

Near Cienfuegos was the scene of a battle during the Spanish–American War on May 11, 1898, between American Marines attempting to sever underwater Spanish communication lines and the Spanish defenders.

During the Cuban Revolution, the city saw an uprising against Fulgencio Batista and was bombed in retaliation on September 5, 1957. The city later became a key industrial centre, part of the revolutionary government's "anti-urban" planning policy, with industrial projects including the never-completed Juraguá nuclear power plant, the "Camilo Cienfuegos" oil refinery named for Camilo Cienfuegos, and the "Carlos Marx" cement factory.

Geography Near the entrance to Cienfuegos Bay is Castillo de Jagua (full name: Castillo de Nuestra Señora de los Angeles de Jagua), a fortress erected in 1745 for protection against Caribbean pirates.

Cienfuegos, one of the chief seaports of Cuba, is a centre of the sugar trade as well as coffee and tobacco. While sugarcane is the chief crop, local farmers also grow coffee.

Sports Cienfuegos fields a team in the Cuban National Series, the Cienfuegos Elefantes. Since joining the league in 1977–78, the best finish the Camaroneros have achieved is a 3rd place showing in the 2010–11 Cuban National Series. Despite finishing with the best record at 59–31, the Elefantes lost the semifinals in six games to the eventual champions, the Pinar del Río Vegueros.

Attractions • Castillo de Nuestra Señora de los Ángeles de Jagua – fortress • Arco de Triunfo – the only Arco de Triunfo in Cuba • Catedral de Nuestra Señora de la Purísima Concepción – cathedral with stained glass work, built 1833–1869 • Delfinario – dolphins and sea lions in a saltwater lagoon • Jardín Botánico de Cienfuegos – 97 hectares of botanic garden • Museo Provincial – furniture and porcelain museum • Palacio de Valle – built 1913–1917 in neo-gothic style • Palmira Yorubá Pantheon – museum of religious afro-catholic syncretism • Parque José Martí – park in Plaza de Armas • Teatro Tomás Terry – colonial style theater • Palacio Ferrer • Malecón de Cienfuegos • Paseo del Prado – longest street in Cuba, full of colorful buildings • Quintero (cigar) cigar factory • University of Cienfuegos "Carlos Rafael Rodríguez" (UCF) – the province's high education institution • Rancho Luna Beach • Nicho • Laguna del Cura - an authentic fishing boat lagoon.

Transportation The city is served by Jaime González Airport, which, as of 2021, partly because of the Covid-19 outbreak, had no scheduled airline flights.

Havana Time 
Havana Time
Image: Adobe Stock roxxyphotos #66112258

Cienfuegos has a population of over 150,000 people. Cienfuegos also forms the centre of the wider Cienfuegos Province which has a population of over 405,481 people.

To set up a UBI Lab for Cienfuegos see: https://www.ubilabnetwork.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/UBILabNetwork

Twin Towns - Sister Cities Cienfuegos has links with:

🇦🇷 Bahía Blanca, Argentina 🇺🇸 Cambridge, USA 🇨🇳 Dalian, China 🇺🇸 Tacoma, USA
Text Atribution: Wikipedia Text under CC-BY-SA license

Antipodal to Cienfuegos is: 99.556,-22.15

Locations Near: Cienfuegos -80.4436,22.15

🇨🇺 Ranchuelo -80.15,22.369 d: 38.9  

🇨🇺 Manicaragua -79.975,22.149 d: 48.3  

🇨🇺 Santa Clara -79.967,22.406 d: 56.7  

🇨🇺 Trinidad -79.967,21.8 d: 62.7  

🇨🇺 Sagua La Grande -80.071,22.809 d: 82.7  

🇨🇺 Camajuaní -79.722,22.467 d: 82.2  

🇨🇺 Placetas -79.654,22.314 d: 83.3  

🇨🇺 Sancti Spíritus -79.433,21.933 d: 106.9  

🇨🇺 Cárdenas -81.205,23.044 d: 126.4  

🇨🇺 Matanzas -81.577,23.042 d: 152.9  

Antipodal to: Cienfuegos 99.556,-22.15

🇮🇩 Sukabumi 106.926,-6.921 d: 18146.4  

🇮🇩 Singaparna 108.11,-7.35 d: 18131.3  

🇮🇩 Bogor 106.797,-6.597 d: 18119.1  

🇮🇩 Tasikmalaya 108.198,-7.316 d: 18123.4  

🇮🇩 Cilacap 109,-7.733 d: 18119.7  

🇮🇩 Ciamis 108.353,-7.326 d: 18116.2  

🇮🇩 Cimahi 107.555,-6.871 d: 18111.8  

🇮🇩 Bandung 107.571,-6.877 d: 18111.6  

🇮🇩 Ciapus 106.467,-6.267 d: 18099.4  

🇮🇩 Serang 106.15,-6.117 d: 18096.8  

Bing Map

Option 1