Book Description 

Cuba reefs host apex predators and coral cover at optimal levels. While Cuban reef vitality may be linked to economic default and no shoreline development, no agricultural pesticides or fertilizers and limited human population growth, the Castro regime is aggressively developing its reef potential.

Seas to the south are now 100% shark protected.

Most Cuba travelogues advise “getting off the beaten path,” but Reef Libre examines that path, to see where it might lead as things change. Will Cuba reefs remain protected? Or is this perilous age of natural decline a last chance to see a healthy reef system?

Robert Wintner and the Snorkel Bob Jardines de la Reina Expedition herein provide narrative insight with photos and video. First stop is the baseline: Havana urban density. Down south at Cayo Largo, reef collapse seems imminent with 600 guests changing daily, and the phosphate-laden laundry water flowing directly to the deep blue sea. Will Cuba’s Ministry of Tourism step up with the Jardines de la Reina paradigm? Rising from the Golfo de Ana María, Jardines is a thousand square miles of mangrove estuary, for ages compromised by constant extraction of its biggest predators, taken as food. Protected, it now rises on the world reef stage.

A DVD comes with the book in a paper sleeve glued to the inside cover. Reef Libre, the movie, runs about an hour.

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My Review

I received a free copy of the book and DVD for an honest review.

Reef Libre looks like a coffee table book, full of beautiful pictures of ocean life, but it’s so much more! It was written by Snorkel Bob and is not just about his group’s trip to Cuba to photograph ocean life. It contains a lot of Cuban history and shows how they live today. It’s a lot different than what we know!

I learned a lot from this book and the DVD. I hadn’t thought about the effect of commercialism on such things as coral reefs until I read this book.

The DVD is a nice addition to the book. It has even more information and amazing videos of ocean life. You can tell that Snorkel Bob and his friend are not actors, but somehow it makes the DVD even better. It’s like watching something a friend put together…a friend who has incredible filming skills.

I definitely recommend this book and DVD for people of all ages. I can’t say enough about the photography. It’s amazing.

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Author’s Bio

Best known as Snorkel Bob in Hawaii and around the world, Robert Wintner captures Cuba above and below the surface with urgency and hope. As a pioneer in fish portraiture, Wintner demonstrated social structure and etiquette in reef society. Reef Libre goes to political context, in which human folly will squander Cuba’s reefs as well—unless natural values can at last transcend political greed. As pundits joust over who did what to whom and why, Wintner ponders reef prospects in view of political changes.

Robert Wintner has authored many novels and story collections. Reef Libre is his fourth reef commentary with photos and his first overview of survival potential in a political maelstrom. He lives and works in Hawaii, still on the front lines of the campaign to stop the aquarium trade around the world.

Connect with the author:     Website  ~   Facebook

 

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