(water splashing) (soft orchestral music) - [Matt] Heaven is that one moment in life that you would live over and over again. It is that moment that I
want to share with you. A moment which starts in a
place called Key West, Florida, with a man named Finbar
Gittelman in a ship named Wolf. - The sea is full of surprises. It's great and vast and
beautiful and scary sometimes. It'll put you to the challenge. You think you've seen it all, and then wham, there's something you
never imagined would happen. The most difficult thing is when things get really dangerous which they can. And I've been very, very lucky. I've been very lucky over the years. I've never lost a crewman. Never. I did lose a ship. I think the most difficult thing that I have to live with is when I lost that ship. To give the order to abandon ship. That's probably the most difficult thing I've ever done in my life. (gentle music) Sea's full of surprises. And she is a hard mistress sometimes, but she's also a wonderful lover. (drums beating) (upbeat music) (water splashing) - [Matt] My name is Matt Dean. Several years ago I lost everything that I thought I cared about and found myself in Florida
attempting to restart my life. I had chased the American dream of having a family and a
house and a steady job. Only to have it completely
turned upside down. In an agonizing six month period of time I'd lost my marriage, my job and the small business that I'd started. In desperation I sold
everything that I had and moved to Orlando, Florida
looking for freelance work. It was around this time
that I was introduced to someone for whom I would
grow to greatly respect. Someone who opened up a
whole new world to me. - I am Finbar Gittelman. I am three quarters of a century old. And I am an Admiral Conch Republic Navy. I'm Supreme Commander of Conch Republic Military
Forces and First Sea Lord. Most folks go through a
period during their childhood and their adolescence where they have to, I guess the expression is, find yourself. And I never had to go through that 'cause I sort of was
always aware of what I am. (gentle music) When I was going to grade school and the boys would play hooky and they'd all go to
the park to play ball, I wouldn't do that. I'd go to the water. I'd go down to the docks and I'd sit there and talk to the old guys hanging out on the docks and then I'd find things that would float. Anything, boards, logs, whatever. Find a piece of line, tie 'em together, make a raft, go paddling around. And that was it, I was always aware that that I was a sailor. I didn't know much of
anything about being a sailor, but I knew that's what I was. And I knew I belonged on the water, since my earliest recollections. When we set the sail, I'll give the orders slack the clew lines,
you let 'em run free. And then somebody's
gonna get on the halyard, which is the first one on this pin. Okay and heave it up as high as it'll go. I feel much more able and capable when I'm at sea than I do when I go to shore. 'Cause when I go to shore, all kinds of things I run into that I don't necessarily understand and is hard to deal with. At sea, I don't have that. Sometimes it's hard to deal with, but never it's anything
I don't understand. Out there, I understand all of it. Hey Matt. - [Matt] How you doing, sir? - Sleep good? - [Matt] I did. - Good. - [Matt] I had been in Fort
Myers for around a year when a friend named John
Biffar introduced me to Finbar, Julie and Wolf, who had been hired to work
a local pirate festival. - Fire! (gun shots) (cannon fire) Okay all headsails on port tack - [Matt] Though I'd never
been on board a ship, I never had a strong draw to the ocean, the moment my foot
touched the deck of Wolf all of that changed. It was like a wave washed over me and separated everything I was before Wolf from everything I was after Wolf. - Welcome aboard folks. I am Finbar the Terrible of Cayo Oeste we're going out today to
do a little hell raising. - [Matt] I found myself falling in love with a world that I had
never known existed. ♪ Early in the morning ♪ ♪ Weigh-Heigh and up she rises ♪ ♪ Weigh-Heigh and up she rises ♪ new ways of living
opened up in front of me like a sail on a ship that'd
been waiting for the wind. Suddenly the rough seas of my own life didn't seem to matter anymore. Hard times were a way of life for a sailor and that was okay. You took the good with the bad and you sailed through to the next port. I sailed on Wolf every chance I had but soon came time to move to California and further pursue my film career. Days turned into years as I
struggled to build a business all the while I longed to return to Wolf. (happy music) In 2015 I get an excited call from Julie. After years of waiting they were finally going to get
the chance to sail to Cuba. Wolf had sailed for decades
around the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico and up and
down the eastern seaboard. But Cuba had been highly restricted. With relations mending between
the Obama administration and the Cuban government a
small window was opening. Julie then told me that
this was the first time Finbar would be traveling back
to Havana in over 50 years. - Some of my earliest memories are in Cuba and things were very, very different then. I used to go there with my family I had some Cuban family. And back in those days
we used to go there, they used to come here, we used to run back
and forth and whatever. And I have a lot of very fond
childhood memories in Cuba. - [Matt] Finbar had grown
up in both Miami and Havana while traveling back and
forth with his father. - Course back in those days you could go back and forth freely and I sometimes tell people the story how we used to drive to Cuba and they didn't believe me. But we did we used to drive
from Miami down to Key West get on the ferry with the car and drive off in Havana. - [Matt] When Castro took over in 1959 Finbar's family fled the
country after being forced to turn over everything
they had to the government. For them the Revolution
left a painful mark. - When I think about Cuba I can't help but relate it
to what my own experiences and the experiences of my family, I have some Cuban family, and they did not fare very well after the Revolution. - [Matt] Finbar would not
be back to Havana again but was drawn back into
Cuban waters in the 1980's. - I was there during the Mariel Boatlift I took part in that. And that was a very emotional thing. A very emotional thing. - [Matt] Finbar's stories
of his time in Cuba were something I'd been
wanting to film for years. So I jumped at the chance
to document the trip. Meanwhile Julie began gathering
a crew to help prepare Wolf. - Some guys are cursed with
a really expensive wife. I'm lucky I don't have that my wife's not all that expensive. But my mistress is. (laughing) - [Matt] The ship needed a lot
of work to be ready to sail but people were happy to help. Wolf has a way of gathering
amazing people around her and sailing to Cuba was a once
in a lifetime opportunity. - We're very lucky in that
we have so many good friends. We have a lot of wonderful
people that hang out with us. And so we're always happy
to have them on board. Each and every one of 'em leaves a little piece
of their spirit aboard. Most people think of a
ship as an inanimate thing and it's not a ship has a spirit. And it's the spirit of
the people who built her, the spirit of the people who sailed on her and a ship acquires a
spirit over the years and becomes a spiritual
being just like a person is. (hammering) (gentle music) Wolf was my fathers name so it's named after him. And he wasn't a sailor but he was a wolf. The other thing is that the
wolf is my spirit animal. I was one of the guys
that actually built her. So I literally have my
blood and sweat in her. She's home. We sometimes live ashore temporarily from time to time but
this is real home, yeah. - [Matt] The ship is nearly
ready when we get word that the Visa's have been approved and we would soon be underway. Julie had arranged for us to
be part of a goodwill race that had secured permits
to sail from Key West to the resort town of Varadero
and then on to Havana. Because the confrontational relationship the U.S. had with Cuba since the 1960's Cuba seemed very mysterious to me. I was interested in finding out more about the people and the living conditions as well as explore the
culture and the history. There were of course hundreds
of places we wanted to see but because we'd be there
for a very short time we'd have to limit our
visits to a few key places. The old Spanish section of Havana, the Hemingway House, Mariel, and most important of
all the Hotel Nacional where Finbar had spent much of his youth. - Yeah I spent a lot of
time there when a kid and I have very, very fond memories of it. - [Matt] The crew finished
loading Wolf with supplies while we watched the wind pick up speed. Sailing requires the right amount of wind. Too much wind makes for a rough and sometimes dangerous trip. Not enough and it can take you days to travel a very small distance. With the last of the supplies loaded we were finally ready to sail for Cuba. - [Finbar] Standby to get underway. Take in the springs. Take in the bow. - [Crew Member] All clear. - [Finbar] Everything clear? - Alright take in the stern. - [Matt] We motor out from
Wolf's home base in safe harbor as the weather takes a turn for the worse. The weather forecasts have
been for short burst of rain but was now turning into a small storm. We had one stop to make to fill up on fuel for Wolf's large diesel engine but as we made our way
to the fueling station our plans for sailing to Cuba
that evening started to fade. - Sometimes you get caught
in real hard weather, dangerous weather, because you have no choice. Mainly in situations
where you're out there and the weather goes bad on you unexpectedly. And there you are so you deal with it. And you just deal with it
like anything else in life that you're faced with all of a sudden. - [Matt] Finbar's past
experience had made him cautious when bad weather was in the forecast. - The most difficult thing is when things get really
dangerous which they can. It's a whole long story how
we got caught in the hurricane but we were between Cuba and Jamaica and the hurricane was forecast
to go well south of Jamaica, we wouldn't have even felt it. Hurricane Allen 1980. (thunder cracks) Category five. It took several erratic turns and it lined right up
on us like a bullseye and it ran us right over. We were in a good ship,
we had a great crew but the forces of nature can
literally beat you to death. And it can take your ship and it took ours and we had
fought a hell of a fight to keep her together
and to keep her afloat and when I knew we were losing the fight I had to order abandon
ship, we got on a life raft. (thunder) And when we were in the
raft we watched her go down. We saw the mast head light
disappear under the waves and it's one of those things,
little things on my mind that haunts me is the sight
of the mast head light was still burning when she went under. I'm gonna say it was around 20 minutes before the eye actually hit us and we went through the
eye of the hurricane and out the other side in the raft and that was a hell of a ride. We ended up spending
four days in the raft. We were eventually picked
up by a Norwegian tanker. We were one of six
vessels sunk that night. There were a total of 55
people lost at sea that night and there were no survivors
from any of the other vessels there were five other vessels sunk no survivors, we were the only
crew that actually survived. Yeah. (gentle music) (distant chatter) - [Finbar] Alright hold that line. - [Matt] Anxiously we waited to see what the morning will bring. (gentle waves) (gentle music) Mornings on the ship
gave me time to reflect. Until the collapse of my
personal and professional life I thought I knew who I
was and what I wanted. When everything fell down around me I was left searching for purpose. Being around Wolf gave me a different way of looking at life. It was no longer a purpose
that mattered as much as just living each moment to the fullest. Joy and disappointment were just different
sides of the same coin. Living life on the deck of a ship made you be completely
aware of the present. - [Woman] Hi Charlie. - [Man] Ahoy Captain.
- [Finbar] Hey. - [Man] I'll see ya. - [Woman] Alright put your stuff in. Oh you got incoming. - [Finbar] Are all hands aboard? (engine roaring) - [Matt] The morning clouds lift, the weather is clear,
we're finally on our way. - [Man] Ready? - [Woman] Ready. ♪ Oh we'd be alright if the
wind were in our sails ♪ ♪ We'd be alright if the
wind were in our sails ♪ ♪ We'd be alright if the
wind were in our sails ♪ ♪ And we'll all hang on behind ♪ ♪ And we'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ We'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ We'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ And we'll all hang on behind ♪ ♪ Oh a night on the town
wouldn't do us any harm ♪ ♪ A night on the town
wouldn't do us any harm ♪ ♪ A night on the town
wouldn't do us any harm ♪ ♪ And we'll all hang on behind ♪ ♪ And we'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ We'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ We'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ And we'll all hang on behind ♪ ♪ Oh another shot of rum
wouldn't do us any harm ♪ ♪ Another shot of rum
wouldn't do us any harm ♪ ♪ Another shot of rum
wouldn't do us any harm ♪ ♪ And we'll all hang on behind ♪ ♪ And we'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ We'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ We'll roll the ol' chariot along ♪ ♪ And we'll all hang on behind ♪ - Okay guys who wants to drive? Whoever sails with me must
tell me they understand and agree to my version of
how a ship needs to run. The ten commandments are as follows: I am the Lord thy Captain there be no higher
authority aboard this ship. Thou shalt not disobey my order. Thou shalt not tell me a lie. Thou shalt never lose thy cool. Thou shalt not take any strong
drink or any strong drugs other than with my permission. Thou shalt not sleep on watch. Thou shalt not waste water. Thou shalt not hassle thy shipmate. Thou shalt not piss to windward and thou shalt not bitch. So be it. Probably the single most important of those commandments is
the fourth commandment thou shalt not lose thy cool. There are situations out there when it gets very scary. When you get scared it's
very, very important not to put your fear on your shipmates. Because if anybody loses their cool and becomes hysterical with fear it's a terrible danger to
themselves and to their shipmates. When you get scared you take your fear and you put it in your pocket and you get on with what you gotta do. The sea and the winds and the waves those are elemental forces and being a sailor, being a real sailor, is living with those
forces day in and day out and being tuned to them. That's one of the things it
takes to make a great sailor. (gentle music) - [Matt] One of the most
amazing experiences on the sea is looking up at the clear night sky and seeing the ocean of stars above you. This however is difficult
to film on a boat. Filming starlight on land is as easy as putting
your camera on a tripod and setting a long exposure. However when sailing on the ocean a long exposure will only give you streaks of lights and blurs due to the movement of the ship. Determined to share the stars
with you as best I could I had to find a camera sensitive enough to record starlight in real time. Fortunately recent
advancements in technology gave me a chance to capture
these elusive dots of light. (resounding music) - [Finbar] Okay now who's on the watch? - [Matt] Depending on the
number of crew members on board each watch is crewed
by two or three people in four to six hour shifts. At night the main duty
is to keep a steady watch on the horizon for other ships. We are now in the Florida Straits a shipping channel where freighters, cruise ships and fishing vessels are numerous and not always easy to see. Our eyes adjust to the extremely low light as we watch for the telltale
green and red lights. Every ship is required to
operate with green and red lights so that other ships can tell
which direction they're going. If you're facing towards the
front or bow of your ship the green light is on the
right or starboard side an the red light is on the
left or portside of the ship. The white light at the top of the mast told other ships that
we were using our engine and not just the sails. The wind is minimal tonight and the current of the gulf
stream is working against us. Though we'd prefer to make
our way under sail alone Wolf's large diesel engine was needed to maintain a reasonable speed. - There are some of us that are still very much
into the old traditions and doing things the old way. I mean for example now you have all this super high tech navigation gear, all these navigation systems and GPS and all this, well, that's all well and good and I use it but if that stuff breaks I'm not lost. I still practice the old ways and I can still get wherever I'm going. One time we were in South America bound for the coast of Columbia and we went through the windward passage and about that time every
piece of navigation gear on the vessel was down. And the sky was completely overcast you couldn't see the
sun to take a sunsight. So we were restricted to
what you call dead reckoning which is considered to be a
primitive form of navigation. Well we reached our destination I was less than five miles off. Using nothing but dead reckoning. So you know, the old ways they still work. In some sense they work better because there's nothing to break. - [Matt] To be within 15
miles of your destination using dead reckoning is
considered highly accurate. Five miles is masterful. To use dead reckoning a sailor starts with a known position and then calculates where they are by using the ships speed,
a watch and a compass. We didn't need that method tonight but when we entered the waters
around Cuba in the morning we would no longer have GPS service and would have to rely on
our compass and the charts. At our current rate it looks like we'll see landfall by morning. (calm music) (gentle waves) ♪ Runnin' down to Cuba we are bound away ♪ ♪ Way me boys to Cuba ♪ ♪ To Cuba's coast at the breakin' of day ♪ ♪ Runnin' down to Cuba ♪ ♪ Way me boys to Cuba ♪ ♪ Runnin' down to Cuba ♪ - [Matt] Land ho a welcome sound no matter
how long you're at sea. Small mounds appear in the distance and we are finally getting
our first glimpse of Cuba. Finbar stands watch looking for signs of the approaching channel. It takes careful eyes to find the markers through which we will have to navigate to get to our first destination, the marina in Varadero. ♪ As a melon and sweet as a mango ♪ ♪ Runnin' down to Cuba ♪ ♪ Way me boys to Cuba ♪ ♪ Runnin' down to Cuba ♪ - I'm not gonna start claiming that I have all this knowledge that nobody else does 'cause it's not so I'm just a regular ol' sailor. But I have a lot of years doing it. What I have learned I very much like to
pass on to my shipmates. Whenever I take a new crewman aboard I say someday you're gonna
meet some guy who is so smart and he's got so much experience
and so much knowledge that he knows all that there
is to know about seamanship. When you meet that guy don't even get on a boat with him 'cause he's a dangerous fool. If you've learned so much that you don't need to learn anymore then you don't know anything. You must be humble before the sea. And you must keep on learning. Hell I learn things from
some of my newest crew I mean everybody's got
something I can learn from. - [Matt] As we enter the
channel we raise our flags to signal where we are from
and where we are going. ♪ Oh I'm leaving from Key
West a land that I love ♪ ♪ To spend a long night on the sea ♪ ♪ I'm bound for Havana
to see an old flame ♪ ♪ Where she'll have some lovin' for me ♪ ♪ So come fill up your glass ♪ ♪ Buy a drink what you please ♪ ♪ Whatever the damage I'll pay ♪ ♪ So be easy and free when
you're drinking with me ♪ ♪ I'm a man you don't meet everyday ♪ ♪ I have a tall ship
I have men I command ♪ ♪ I've lived my whole life on the sea ♪ - [Matt] We follow the guide boat through the rocky outcroppings
called breakwater. And enter the interior of
the marina at Varadero. We are anxious but hopeful that we will get through
customs without incident. I'm slightly concerned
that the camera equipment I brought to document this
trip may cause problems. And Wolf being a pirate
ship has a cannon on board which suddenly seems like a bad idea. After a few tries to get the rope secure we are safely docked in Varadero. - [Crew] Here here! - [Matt] Now we'll hand
over our passports and wait. - [Man] Everybody's passport. - [Matt] Concerned that
the government officials wouldn't want to be filmed
I put down my camera and had to use my phone as an alternative. - [Cuban Official] How many
persons do you have from boat? - How many persons, 12. - [Cuban Official] 12. - We started to try to put
together a trip last December and it was just going
through an awful lot of hoops you had to work with the state department, with the commerce department, get this permission and that permission. And now they've opened it up to anybody that wants to come and do
a people to people exchange but we tried last year and everything was still a
lot of hoops to jump through and all of sudden July,
everything was opening up, September it opened up more and now you write a postcard application and wait for three weeks and you get approved and you can go. - [Matt] The customs agents were thorough questioning us about everything we were bringing into the country. They asked about the
cameras but seemed convinced that they were just for tourism. And they didn't seem
bothered by the cannon since it was staying on the ship. - [Man] Looks easy enough. - [Matt] The crew set off to
where they'd spend the night while Julie and Finbar stayed on the ship. Since we would be here
for less than 24 hours they chose to remain aboard and save their energy for the
continuing sail to Havana. (light instrumental music) I made the half mile walk to my hotel and found the streets surprisingly empty. I had anticipated seeing
more of the Cuban culture only to find that
Varadero is a resort town not unlike other resort towns in other tropical destinations. Arriving at the hotel I found a number of my fellow
sailors waiting at the bar. It turns out that the
resort gave their guests all the free Havana Club
Rum they could drink and I soon found out why it
was envied around the world. Havana Club Rum quickly
became a favorite of mine and I would find ways to lighten
the weight of my suitcase so I could bring home as many
bottles as I could carry. Whether on land or on sea
I find the water soothing. The beaches in Varadero were even more so. Compared to the crowded
slips of sand in Los Angeles this was amazingly peaceful. Though my time in Varadero was limited I could not help but
sit and watch the waves. (light instrumental music) The resort was beautiful as well but it was like so many other resorts in so many other places that
I spent little time there and found myself anxious
to get back to the ship. (light instrumental music) - I love it, I love it. - Okay, good. (drumming) It's little but...
(drumming) - [Finbar] Hey thank you. - Yeah you bet. Thank you for bringing me to Cuba. - [Matt] With a nudge
from the same two boatmen who helped us dock we
headed out of the marina and back into open waters. Next stop, Havana. (light inspiring music) - I've been all over the
U.S. east coast and the Gulf, Bahamas, all over the
Caribbean, South America, both east and west coasts. I've been across the
Pacific a couple of times. What I love most about
it are those moments when everything is as it should be, fair wind and relatively calm seas and you're going somewhere and
you're out there under sail, everything's trimmed up
just right and you sit back and you look around you and
you see the wonderment of it. It's my home. It's where I live, It's where
I travel, It's what I do. (pulleys spinning) Just the people, the beauty
of it, the way of life suits me perfectly it
runs at the right speed. Of course I enjoy the
company of my fellow sailors. 'Cause that's a world
that we share, you know. The work, the adventures, and the satisfaction of being what I am. Just the satisfaction of
it, that's the best thing. (gentle elegant music) - [Matt] We follow the
coastline through the night never losing sight of a string of lights that are just a few miles away. (ship creaking) (gentle waves) (happy music)
(singing in foreign language) Finally after months of planning Havana is in view. (singing in foreign language) For a man who isn't given
to emotional displays there's no hiding the excitement of seeing Havana for the
first time in 50 years. (singing in foreign language) Approaching a city from the ocean is a marvelous site. Everything along the
waterfront is laid bare and the skyline seems to go for miles. What a relief this would have been for sailors who had spent months at sea chasing the currents
in the Atlantic Ocean. (singing in foreign language) - [Matt] The Marina Hemingway is a mix of well kept buildings
with a fresh coat of paint and ruins of buildings that look untouched since the Revolution. We would soon find out that
much of Cuba is the same. (singing in foreign language) - Take up on aft spring. - Gracious Senor. - Okay. Very good. - Thank you. - [Matt] The approval for us to leave would come from the dock master. And then with no fanfare we have arrived. (joyful music) (singing in foreign language) Overnight we stayed in a Casa Particular which is a private home that residents have turned into a hotel much like Airbnb. We hail a taxi to drive us
to our first destination the historic Spanish section of Havana. Our taxi driver turns out to be famous Cuban actor
Jose Antonio Espinosa who's using his private car
to make a little extra money. It seems the Cubans have
been well ahead of the U.S. in the going trend of private taxi service but without the need of
an app for your phone. Phone service is a little spotty in Cuba but all Jose needed was a
sign on the front of his car and he was in business. We turn onto the famous Malecon a stretch of road that follows
the shoreline along Havana. Finbar nods to the right and I get my first glimpse of the location of his famous Cuba stories the Hotel Nacional. (singing in foreign language) We'll start our tour
near the former Capital and work our way along to the harbor. Where we'll find the
oldest buildings in Havana. Our small group stands
out as obvious tourists amongst the Cuban nationals. We're followed by polite
glances and a few smiles as we navigate the debris filled streets. Before coming I read a few
books on the history of Cuba and tried to learn a little Spanish so as not to seem indifferent. However books can not take the place of being there in person. Being in a place has a way of washing away any preconceived notions of that place and of the people living there. It wasn't hard to imagine young Finbar walking the streets in Havana. Not much has changed since the 1950's. The cars were the most obvious and as we we're surrounded
by Spanish buildings built in the 17 and 1800's it was as though we'd
stepped into a time capsule that covered hundreds of years of history. (calm music) Cuba has gone through
a number of Revolutions since it was first
occupied by the Spanish. But it was the latest Revolution that was forefront on Finbar's mind. The era since Castro's Revolution in 1959 has been difficult for Cuba. Relations with the U.S. had
been pushed to the brink of war and Castro's view on ruling the island had been polarizing to some Cubans. For decades Cuba was
supported by the Soviet Union but when it collapsed Cuba
was once again on it's own. After years of animosity a
hope of a new future was rising as relations between the
U.S. and Cuba warmed. Finbar's feelings were also warming as childhood memories flooded back. - [Woman] Is it? - [Finbar] Of course there's feelings 'cause I spent a lot of time
in Cuba when I was a boy. I have a lot of very fond
childhood memories, very fond. - [Matt] For the rest of us
each street was a new discovery. Beautiful theaters, 400 year old forts, crumbling ruins, Havana is a fascinating city of contrasts. (calm music) I reach the Malecon once
again as the work day ended and people begin to gather by the water. (calm music) Across the entry to the harbor the Morro Castle guards the city. Hundreds of years ago pirates would fight the Spanish for the gold that they were
taking from the Americas. Had Finbar been alive during those times I have no doubt that he too would have been out on those waters, musket and sword in hand. After walking much of the city the gang rested for a bit before celebrating our
arrival at the Hotel Nacional. (happy music) (singing in foreign language) - I used to come here
a lot with my father. Sometimes we would check into a hotel and the old man would
go off with cousin Jose for a day or two. My father, he was a real live
and let live kind of guy, he didn't have a lot of don't
do this and don't do that. But he did have one that
he was very strict about he was a teetotaler, he was absolutely
against drinking alcohol, he didn't drink a drop himself and he wasn't about to
let me drink a drop. So the one strict rule
that I had was no booze. Well here I am I'm 14 years old and I'm in this hotel and the old man had
told the hotel manager, give the kid anything
he wants but no booze. Well naturally, 14 year olds
they want certain things that are forbidden and I
wanted a bottle of rum. So I hatched a plan. In those days in Cuba every good hotel had at least two bars. One of them was where the ladies of the night would hang out. I said well here's my plan,
I'm gonna go in there, I'm gonna hook up with one of these girls, I'll get her to get me a bottle of rum. So I walk in to the bar and I look around and there's a bunch of ladies all very well dressed and really pretty. Most of them looked like
they'd been around the block maybe one more time than usual. There was this one very
young, very innocent, gorgeous looking young gal,
kinda sittin' by herself. So I walk over and I introduce myself and we're making small
talk and we get to talkin', I said can I get ya a drink? Oh sure. So I go over to the bartender, I said let me have a glass of wine, and the bartender says, well
kid you know I can't serve ya. I said, no it's not for me it's for Maria. Okay. So he gave me a glass of
wine and I give it to her and I'm sittin' there drinkin' a coke and we're talkin' back and forth and then I mustered up my courage I said here's ten bucks,
go get me a bottle of rum and get a bottle of whatever you like and I'm in room 206. So I go up to the room
and I'm pacing around and nervous in anticipation. There's a knock on the
door and there stands Maria with a bottle of wine and bottle of rum and so she comes in and we're
sittin' there having a drink and another drink and so on and so on. The window was open and
hearing all this sensual music from down below and the mood was building. And at one point she
begins to get undressed she's unbuttoning her
shirt and getting undressed and I guess my eyes got kind of big and I'm looking at her and
my mouth was open, ahhhh. And she looked at me in
a comical kind of way and she said are you surprised? I said well, you know,
I wanted a bottle of rum and I like the company and you know, but, but, but, you know and
I was just kinda tongue tied. And she says, well you know you rented my services for
the evening, and I'm here, and all the while she's
continuing to get undressed. And she's beautiful. I'm at this point real awkward and then she turns to me and she says, you never been with a
woman before like this? Ah, ah, well, ah, ah, well, well no. She said, come here. She took me by the hand and led me and I'm, I'm just gonna
skip the rest of the story 'cause you know, I'll leave
the details to your imagination but it was one of the most
beautiful nights I ever had. And the memory is engraved in my mind and, well there it is. (singing in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) - [Matt] We hire a taxi driver to take us to the Hemingway House and mention that we'd
love some Cuban coffee. Our driver Gaspar takes us to a local cafe
where we get a chance to learn more about Havana from a local. Gaspar moved with his family
from Baracoa in southern Cuba to Havana to be a taxi driver. The tourist industry has become the driving economy in Havana and is providing a good
life for he and his family. Gaspar's thoughtful insights
on the Cuban way of life are hopeful and encouraging. He and Finbar are quick friends and we dubbed him our official tour guide the remainder of the trip. - Now I'm here in Cuba and I'm experiencing Cuba on the street and talking to people and I have to say I'm pleasantly surprised because there is obviously
a greater degree of freedom than what I had expected to see. And that makes me very happy. (happy music) - [Matt] There is a love
that the Cuban people have for Ernest Papa Hemingway. His celebrity status
is one of a small God. The Hemingway House is
the most visited museum in all of Cuba. The monument to days of glory, the house is kept exactly as it was when Hemingway left it
for the last time in 1960. A fighter and a lover the public image Hemingway left us with reminds me much of Finbar. They are both what some may call the world's most interesting men whose adventures have
chased them around the world and who's life on the water
is the stuff of legend. Tourist guides fill in the
details of the lives spent here. The houses itself seems quiet as if it's waiting breathlessly
for the owner to return. (calm music) Above the buzz of the
tourists at the main house Hemingway's upper reading room and office looks out across Havana
all the way to the ocean. Here he can watch for clear days to take his beloved Pilar out
for adventures on the sea. Hemingway would chase adventures in Pilar like the shadows of Nazi subs
in the waters off the coast. Finbar however met adventure with caution knowing the cost if things went wrong. One of the adventures that chased him was the trip to Mariel in the 1980's. Mariel is a port where filming
is not usually permitted so I'd have to be on my guard. - Mariel. Talking about Mariel kind of rattles my cage a little bit so. We're in Key West, I think
it was April of 1980. All of a sudden Fidel had decided that there was a lot of folks
that wanted to get out of Cuba and I guess he felt that those folks that wanted to leave were useless to him. So he decided to allow an exodus. The condition was that Cuban Americans could come get the people
that they wanted to take out and they had to come with a
boat and take them that way. It must have been half the Cubans in Miami decided they were gonna
go on this adventure. Many of them came to Key West. I had not really intended to
take part in this boatlift. My family was already out of Cuba so I had nobody to go there to get out. But people came in and wanted
to charter my boats to do this and I was kind of scared
of getting in a position where I could lose my
boat to the government. And so I decided my boats ain't going. Then one day some folks
come into my office and they said, look we have a situation and we need a Captain. We chartered this big boat in Miami, it was an 85 foot
overgrown sightseeing boat. They arrived in Key West
and the Captain and crew got cold feet and they
jumped off and disappeared. And at first I was very reluctant to do it then they bring in this old grandma she must have been in her 80's. And she begins to plead with me. I have to go there to get my nino's it's my whole life. So finally I broke down and
I said, yeah I'll take ya. We had 37 Cuban Americans aboard and they wanted to bring back
about a hundred relatives. We get over there and in the morning there was countless boats milling around outside the entrance to Mariel Harbor. And there's Cuban gunboats and they're running around
kind of herding everybody. There must have been well
over a thousand boats anchored in Mariel Harbor. Big boats, little boats,
all kind of boats. Shrimpers, fishing boats, yachts, and I never saw such a
crowded harbor in my life. We soon realized that all these
boats were waiting to load and some of them had
been waiting for weeks and we realized because we had thought, well you come in there you
get the people and you leave but that's not how it was, you got in there and you waited a turn. They would make announcements
every couple of hours which boats to come to the dock and load. Name of our boat didn't come up day after day after day. The days got long and
the tempers got short. Now we're there for 18 days. The supplies are running low and water was running low. Comes a boat alongside
with three soldiers in it, they just came aboard without asking one of my crew runs over and says, hey what are you guys doing? Captain, where is Captain? Crew came over and said,
we got visitors here. I got down to the deck and guy with the most stripes
on his arm turned to me he said, you come Colonel want to see you. I said, I ain't going nowhere with you. He looks at me up and down and of course he's wearing
a piece on his belt and he reaches down and he
puts his hand on the piece, he didn't draw it but he puts his hand on and he says, you will come with us. Well obviously I have no choice. I told Bad Bob one of my crew, you're in charge I have
to go with these guys if I don't come back you know what to do. Me, I'm shakin' myself to pieces. I'm just trembling inside
and I'm trying to be cool, I'm trying to look cool, very difficult. 'Cause I am just really rattled
and I have reason to be. And this goes back to a whole nother story but I didn't want anybody there in Mariel to know who I was in
particular, I could be grabbed and I thought that's
what they were there for. - [Matt] We arrive at Mariel Harbor in search for the right place
to film Finbar by the water. While discussing the location a local government informant
approaches the car. (speaking in foreign language) - [Matt] Concerned for
the safety of our driver and ourselves we leave
that part of Mariel. A few miles down the road we
enter a residential section and find access to the water. I switch once again to
filming with my phone. - And we go across the harbor and there is a great
big hundred foot yacht. And it come up alongside
and take me aboard. So they open the door and
I walk into this office and there stands this
guy, a tall, well built, very dark, and very good looking man in an immaculate starched white uniform and he's got a little
swagger stick in his hand and he's pacing around slapping his swagger stick into his hand and I can see he's clearly
annoyed about something. And when I walked into the
office he put the stick down and he turned around and he
smiled at me (speaking Spanish) and he motioned me over to
a real comfortable chair and he walked around and sat behind his desk across from me. And he began just small talk in Spanish. (speaking Spanish) Then he takes and he opens a box of cigars and he offers me one. I take a cigar and I light it up and he lights one up and
he and I are sittin' there smokin' cigars and drinking coffee. And he says, you see,
life is good in Cuba. And I just replied without thinking I just said, well I guess
it depends who you are. And he frowned for just a moment then the smile came back
and the small talk continued and this went on for about 20 minutes. And then all of a sudden he gets a serious expression on his face and he says in perfect English without a trace of an accent he says, now Captain down to business. I said, oh shit. I don't know why he's been
playing with me all this time but this is it the
hammer is about to drop. And then he says to me,
Captain you have a big boat. I said, Si, Senor. He says I need your big boat. I said, what do you mean
you need my big boat? He says, well I have certain people that we are sending out of here and I need to put them on your boat. And I realized when
he's talkin' about this that I am not there to be busted. He either doesn't know or doesn't care about the other stuff. And so I'm sitting there in a mixture of relief and frustration not knowing what to do, what to say, mentally I'm trying to change gears and I guess I quit shaking and I said, well Colonel these
people chartered the boat and I'm responsible to them. And he says to me, he says, well Captain you don't have
much choice in this matter. At this point I'm gathering my wits and I'm not worried anymore and I said, well yes I do have
something to say about it I'm the master of that vessel and she will not leave
except with whom I came for. And he looks at me and he
stares at me for awhile and then very slowly he reaches down and he pulls out his piece a G.I..45. (laughs) and he lays it on the desk the gesture is obvious. I don't know what the
hell to do at this point but I say this son of a
bitch wants to be dramatic well I'll show him some drama. And so happens I was wearing a knife, a big knife, I had a fairly
big Bowie knife on my belt which, you know sailors carry a knife. So I reached down, very
slowly I reached down and I drew the knife and
I laid it on the desk. And he looks at that and he looks at me and then suddenly he
gets a big broad smile and he says, very good
Captain but no match. He says, tomorrow at 9 o'clock you will bring your vessel to the dock and we will load with whom I say. So the next morning I
bring the boat to the dock and they start loading people, some of them are people we came for. And then he starts loading other people, lots of other people. Well this boat was actually certified to carry 99 passengers plus crew but now we've got about 150 people on here and they keep bringing them on. I said, now hey wait a minute I can't carry more people than this it's not safe, I don't
have life jackets for 'em. That's enough. And this guy turns to me and he says, we'll tell you when it's enough. And they keep loading
and they keep loading and they keep loading. And these people are on deck and they're packed in like sardines. We got 311 people on board. And I said to them, I
said, no stop, that's it! I am not taking another one. The guy says you know if we need to we can take you off here and we can put another
captain on this boat. I said well that's what
you're gonna have to do 'cause I ain't taking anymore. So he kinda scratched his
head and he looks around and he picks up his phone
and he calls the Colonel, the one that I had been
with the day before. And they went off in a corner
and they started talking, I didn't hear what they said but, he comes back and he said, okay go! So now I got 311 people plus our crew. She's way, way, way overloaded. But that's what I got
so we go for Key West. It got a little rough and that ship was rolling
around like a pig, those people were packed in so tight and a lot of them began to get sick. But we got into Key West safely, in the morning came our
turn to come to the dock and these people were gettin' off the boat and walking down that gangway and each and every one of 'em would kneel down and kiss the ground. And finally everybody's unloaded and I was the last one off and I did the same. Just bent over and kissed America. (elegant music) - [Matt] I didn't understand what the term learning the ropes meant
until I came aboard your ship. (Finbar quietly laughs) - [Matt] What have you
loved most over the years? - Oh I'd have to boil that down to various women and various ships. I have loved ships and I have loved women of course it's different. A love of the ocean, well that's, it's being where I belong. It's doing what I belong doing. The satisfaction of being what I am. Just the satisfaction of
it, that's the best thing. (lively music) (chatter) Alright take in, take in
the all the string lines, take in the bow. Alright take a fender
back, all the way back. (lively music) - [Matt] Our adventure in
Cuba was coming to a close but we would soon return. I could only carry a limited
supply of rum and cigars in my suitcase and the habits formed here are not easily satisfied. (lively music) I am the Lord thy Captain there shall be no higher
power aboard this ship. Thou shalt not disobey my order. Thou shalt not tell me bullshit. Thou shalt not lose thy cool. Thou shalt not take any strong
drink or any strong drugs unless with my permission. Thou shalt not sleep on watch. Thou shalt not waste water. Thou shalt not hassle thy shipmate. Thou shalt not piss to windward. And thou shalt not bitch. So be it. - [Woman] Ay ay. - So be it? Very well. - [Matt] This journey to
Cuba was a great reminder of why I fell in love with sailing. And to the lessons I learned
from Finbar over the years. I try now to live in the present not knowing when I'll
be back this way again. I leave this moment with
a renewed satisfaction of who and what I am. And I owe it all to two things, the old man and the sea. (lively triumphant music)
After he ran aground out front by the Casa, he became known as Sandbar 🤣.