El Morro and La Cabaña

Havana's harbour is entered through a narrow channel, and both sides of it are fortified. El Morro, begun in the late sixteenth century, sits on the rock at the tip with a lighthouse and thick sloping walls, built to stop the raids that repeatedly sacked the city. La Cabaña, on the ridge behind it, is far larger, one of the biggest fortresses the Spanish ever built in the Americas, thrown up after the British briefly took Havana in 1762 and the Spanish concluded that the high ground had to be held. Both form part of the Old Havana World Heritage listing. The best-known thing about them is the cañonazo, a ceremony held every evening at nine in which soldiers in eighteenth-century uniform march out and fire a cannon across the water, a signal that once marked the closing of the harbour chain.

The main sights

• El Morro - the harbour-mouth fortress and its lighthouse.
• La Cabaña - the vast ridge fortress with its walls, moats and tunnels.
• The cañonazo - the nine o'clock cannon fired by soldiers in period uniform.
• The harbour view - Old Havana and the Malecón seen across the water.

When to go

November to April is driest. The cannon ceremony is at nine every evening, and people arrive from about eight to get a place at the wall, so plan to see the fortress in the late afternoon and stay on. Sunset over the city from the ramparts is the best view in Havana.

What to expect

The two fortresses are large, exposed and separately ticketed, and there is a lot of walking between them in the heat. The cannon ceremony is short, a few minutes of drill and one bang, after a long wait in a crowd, which some find underwhelming for the build-up. Getting back to Old Havana afterwards means a taxi through the tunnel, and drivers know it, so agree the fare first.

Nearby

Old Havana is across the water; the Christ of Havana statue stands on the same ridge.