The Villa of San Cristóbal de La Habana resettles for the third time.The first mass and town council meeting are estimated to have taken place at the spot where El Templete monument stands todaym in the Plaza de Armas.

Havana is the country’s capital.The city had others settlements before relocating near the bay-s entrance. Originally, the Spanish led by Pánfilo de Narváez founded the villa on the southern coast of the current Havana province and afterwards moved the city to an area close by the Almendares, the area known today as Puentes Grandes.

El Templete.  It was built in 1828 at the spot where the first mass and town council were supposedly held in Havana, in 1519, byAntonio María de la Torre.The monument is surrounded by a small garden and it is shaped as a singular Doric temple housing three large oil paintings by French painter Juan Bautista Vermay.El Templete rises at the back of the square and at the East side of the Plaza de Armas.

Plaza de Armas.  It is the oldest of all of the squares still existing in Havana and it is estimated it existed since 1577. Actually, for quite a long time the Plaza de Armaswas the villa’s center, where the laws and most important news were proclaimed.The square transformed in the 18th century, with the construction of the Palaces of the Lieutenant General and of the Governor, Municipality and Jail -also known as the Captain General’s Palace- and the palaces of some noblemen, of which only the Count of Santovenia’s palace is the only one standing today.

Almendares River.  Theriverissome 38 kilometerslong. It is born in the Gallo and Peregrina ravines, in the Tapaste hills and empties in the west of Havana’s bay. This river has been vital for the development of the Cuban capital. Its waters have supplied Havana’s homes, first in barrels and then by the Zanja Real, the aqueduct built to grant access to the liquid. Thanks to tunnels and bridges, the Almendares river has not been an obstacle for the traffic between the East and West areas in Havana.

Puentes Grandes.  The old town ofPuentes Grandes was founded at the end of the 16th century, it was a hamlet built around one of the first sugar mills set up around Havana.

The sugar mill was owned by Hernán Manrique de Rojas.

When the land was used for other crops, the sugar mill’s workers kept living there in their houses and bohíos.

In 1740 and later on in 1762, when Havana was sieged and taken by the English, the town-s name appeared in official documents. The name came from the two bridges over the Almendares river that open the rods to the city’s western side.