I spent about a week in Havana and western Cuba (with my good friend Barbara) as a part of a tour organized by the alumni associations of Carnegie Mellon University and MIT. The tour, because we were traveling on an approved Treasury license, was a charter flight operated by Continental Airlines out of Miami International Airport.

On the return flight, we timed how long it took from wheels-up until we spotted the Florida Keys—just 17 minutes. It reminds you of how close, and yet how far, Cuba is from the United States.