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A Cuban adventure turns to business gold -- How one local businessman has

When Bermuda entrepreneur Donald Morris was looking to branch out into the Caribbean, communist Cuba was not high on his list of places to expand his tour boat business.

But after checking out the possibilities on several islands, the chairman of Bermuda Island Cruises was pleasantly surprised to find that Fidel Castro's government welcomed him more warmly than most.

It was seven years ago that Mr. Morris made his first trip to Havana and immediately he realised the immense untapped tourism potential of the biggest island in the Caribbean.

He took the plunge at a time when many others were wary of investing in a country where Americans are forbidden to spend money by their own government -- and he has never looked back.

Two years ago, BIC bought the old Bermuda tender Canima and Mr. Morris took her to Cuba, refurbished her completely and renamed her Havana Princess .

The boat once fitted with most spartan of facilities and used for ferrying around cruise ship passengers is now a floating bar, restaurant and nightclub, working out of Havana's picturesque harbour.

As Cuba's visitor numbers increase even faster than Bermuda's plummet, Mr.

Morris can reflect with satisfaction on how he had the foresight to invest ahead of the boom.

After showing this reporter round the Princess , docked in Havana's Hemingway Marina undergoing a clean-up ahead of the busy season, Mr. Morris admitted that things were not quite as he had anticpated when he first visited Cuba in 1994.

"I expected to see soldiers with machine guns at every street corner because that's what you read in the papers in the States,'' said Mr. Morris.

"I saw none of that. All I saw was a country keen to do business.'' Mr. Morris and his brother Derek wanted to look beyond Bermuda for extra business for their tour boats as Bermuda's tourism slump had already started.

Cuba was the answer to their prayers.

"We had five boats in Bermuda in 1985 when the decline in tourism began,'' said Mr. Morris. "It didn't get better, every year it kept getting worse.

"We could not sail all of them in Bermuda's declining market, so I spent six or seven years looking for other resorts where I could employ the boats.

"I went all through the Caribbean, to places like the Virgin Islands and Cancun. When I looked around, I found it was very difficult to operate anywhere in the Caribbean. In most places, a business has to be 60 percent owned by a local.

"Then a friend of mine suggested Cuba, so I went and had a look and the rest is history.'' He increased his business interests in Cuba in degrees.

"On my first visit, in July 1994, I spent about three days looking around. I approached Marina Purtosol, the Government agency for managing the marinas, to see how I could go about doing business and they were very helpful.

"I brought my first boat down in July, 1996 and my second in December, 1996.

And then I brought the Canima down in December, 1998.'' Asked how he had found setting up and running a business in a country run by an apparently anti-capitalist government, Mr. Morris said he had experienced no problems.

"In Cuba, the Government is a partner in every business and with us, it works out as about a 50-50 split,'' he said.

"I look at them as people rather than communists. I find them easy to do business with and they are honourable.'' The conversion of the Canima into the Princess , with its three decks and four bars, a lower-deck restaurant which seats 80 diners, a piano bar and a top deck with a dance floor used for cabarets, required a lot of expertise.

Two stairwells and hydraulic ramps had to be ripped out, the sides were widened and a brand new interior, including teak and mahogany fittings, was installed. He had no problems finding the workers with the right skills -- and at the right price -- in Cuba.

"I just told them what I wanted doing and they did it,'' said Mr. Morris.

"They are very clever people and very highly skilled.

"And they did it much cheaper than I could have got it done anywhere else.

The reason is wages. In Bermuda, a welder might make about $45 an hour, here they earn about $9 an hour.'' Business for the Princess was brisk as tourism flourished throughout the late 90s. Visitor numbers continue to rise.

"In 1994, Cuba had around 540,000 tourists,'' said Mr. Morris. "In 2000, they had around two million. There are in excess of 30 flights a week from Europe and last year there were more than half a million Canadian visitors.

"I believe their projections for the year 2005 are for four million visitors -- and that's without the Americans.'' Cuba has a rich multi-cultural heritage, with strong Spanish and African influences, a fascinating capital city blessed with street upon street of well preserved, centuries-old Spanish architecture and hundreds of vintage American cars, dating from before the 1959 revolution, still in working use. It also boasts the fine beaches and pleasant weather to be expected from a Caribbean island.

And it has an added attraction to visitors that most other holiday destinations, in particular Bermuda, can't compete with -- things are cheap there.

"I think much of Cuba's appeal can be put down to price,'' said Mr. Morris.

"It's inexpensive. Price is why Bermuda's tourism industry is down. You can't expect people to go to Bermuda when they can go to other places for half the price.'' At the time of writing, Mr. Morris was considering offers to buy the Princess or to lease it from him.

He has been so impressed with the boat-building and engineering skills he found in Cuba, he now plans to manufacture catarmarans there for export.