When the Spanish conquistadors reached the westernmost tip of Cuba, they came across a people that even seemed ancient to the Taíno themselves: people who lived in caves, without sowing or firing pottery, who survived on what the sea and the scrub gave. They were the guanahatabey, and the name of this peninsula comes from them. The name of the Guanahacabibes Peninsula comes, indeed, from the guanahatabey (also spelled guanahacabibe or guanajatabey), one of the oldest native peoples of Cuba, who inhabited precisely the westernmost tip of the island at the time of the Europeans' arrival. Unlike the Taíno and other Arawak groups who populated much of Cuba, the guanahatabey were a people of a much more archaic culture, devoted to hunting, fishing and gathering, without developed agriculture or pottery.
The Spanish chronicles and archaeological studies describe the guanahatabey as hunter-gatherers who lived in caves and coastal areas of the westernmost region, withdrawn toward the tip of the island. For the native peoples, this remote and hard-to-reach peninsula was a marginal but inhabited territory, and its name became forever associated with this human group. The place name Guanahacabibes is thus one of the living testimonies of the oldest indigenous presence in Cuba.
With the conquest and colonization, the guanahatabey —like the rest of Cuba's native peoples— practically disappeared, victims of violence, disease and displacement. But their mark endures in the name of this peninsula, in archaeological remains found in the area and in the memory that here, at the western edge of the island, lived one of the oldest peoples of the Caribbean.
During the centuries of Spanish rule, the Guanahacabibes Peninsula remained practically on the margins of Cuba's development. Its remoteness, its climate, its limestone and arid soil, its dense forests and the lack of good harbors and abundant fresh water made it one of the least populated and least exploited areas on the island, in contrast to the fertile sugar and tobacco plains of the rest of the west.
While the nearby Pinar del Río region developed as a great tobacco- and coffee-producing area, Guanahacabibes remained a wild frontier, covered in forest and hard to reach. At most, it served as an occasional refuge, a place of passage or a site of isolated activities. That historic marginalization, which at the time was synonymous with backwardness and neglect, turned out, paradoxically, to be the key to its great present value: the scant human intervention allowed the peninsula to keep its ecosystems almost intact.
The only element of importance that the colonial era left at the tip of the peninsula was its lighthouse, raised on the Cape of San Antonio to guide ships at one of the most strategic points of Caribbean navigation, where the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea meet. Otherwise, Guanahacabibes remained, well into the 20th century, a remote and wild land.
At the westernmost tip of Cuba, the Cape of San Antonio marks the point where the island ends and where the Gulf of Mexico meets the Caribbean Sea. This place has great importance for navigation: through here pass the routes that connect the gulf with the Caribbean and the Atlantic, in an area of currents and shallows dangerous for ships. That is why, in the middle of the colonial era, it was decided to raise a lighthouse there.
The Roncali lighthouse was opened on September 15, 1850, during Spanish rule. Its construction, authorized by the governor general O'Donnell, was carried out between 1846 and 1849, and was completed under the government of Federico de Roncali, count of Alcoy, whose surname gave the work its name. Built at this extreme and solitary point, its function was to guide the ships that rounded the west of Cuba, warning them of the closeness of the coast and the dangers of the passage. The lighthouse became, for a long time, practically the only construction of importance in this corner of the island and a symbol of the Cape of San Antonio.
More than a century and a half later, the Roncali lighthouse still marks the westernmost tip of Cuba and is the emblematic image of the Cape of San Antonio, today within Guanahacabibes National Park. For the travelers who reach this remote point, the lighthouse represents the Cuban 'end of the world': the place where the land ends and the immense sea begins.
The 20th century brought the recognition of the extraordinary natural value of Guanahacabibes, precisely what its historic isolation had allowed to conserve. The peninsula preserves extensive almost pristine semi-deciduous forests, mangroves, lagoons, caves and a coast of very rich coral reefs, plus a notable diversity of flora and fauna, with species endemic to Cuba, migratory birds and sea turtle nesting areas.
In recognition of that natural heritage, UNESCO in 1987 declared the Guanahacabibes Peninsula a Biosphere Reserve, within its Man and the Biosphere (MAB) Programme. Subsequently, part of the territory was constituted as Guanahacabibes National Park, with a strict protection regime that regulates access, activities and the use of resources to preserve the ecosystems. The management is organized from the La Bajada ecological station, which controls the trails, the wildlife watching and the visits.
This protected-area status made Guanahacabibes one of the great natural sanctuaries of Cuba and a leading ecotourism destination. The protection seeks to reconcile conservation with responsible nature tourism —guided trails, bird and turtle watching, reef diving— that allows the peninsula to be seen without damaging its fragile balance. The 'forgotten land' of the colonial era was thus transformed into an internationally recognized environmental treasure.
The best-known name of Guanahacabibes for travelers is, without a doubt, María la Gorda, a cove of transparent waters on the south coast of the peninsula that became, from the late 20th century, one of Cuba's main diving destinations. The place name is surrounded by legends: the most widespread tells the story of a woman —María, nicknamed 'la Gorda' (the fat one)— who is said to have lived in this remote spot on the coast, giving the place its name; like so many such tales, it mixes history and tradition.
Beyond the legend, what gave María la Gorda fame were its seabeds. The coral reefs of the Corrientes cove, very well preserved thanks to the isolation and protection of the area, offer coral walls, giant sponges, abundant marine life and exceptional visibility. The development of a dive center and a lodging complex made it possible to put these reefs within the reach of divers from around the world, making María la Gorda a benchmark for diving in Cuba and the Caribbean.
Today, María la Gorda is the tourist gateway to Guanahacabibes and the point where the lodging and the activity are concentrated. Its development as a diving destination, integrated into the protection framework of the national park and the biosphere reserve, symbolizes the present of the peninsula: a remote and wild frontier that has become a destination of nature and adventure, valued by those seeking the reefs, the forests and the feeling of being at the edge of Cuba. The history of Guanahacabibes remains tied, as always, to its nature.