Beyond Miramar, 5ta Avenida curls around the half-moon Playa Marianao and passes through the Náutico and Flores districts, the setting for Havana’s elite prerevolutionary social clubs and balnearios. Following the Revolution they were reopened to the hoi polloi and rechristened.

The beaches—collectively known as Playas del Oeste—are popular with Cubans on weekends, when they get crowded. There was even an eponymous mini-version of New York’s famous Coney Island theme park, re-created in 2008 as Isla de Coco Parque Temático, Havana’s only amusement park.

Commanding the scene are the palatial Mudejar-style former Balneario de la Concha (5ta e/ 112 and 146), and immediately west, the Balneario Club Náutico with its sweeping modernist entrance. Beyond the Río Quibu, 5ta Avenida passes into the Flores district. The Havana-Biltmore Yacht and Country Club was here, dating from 1928 and fronting Havana’s most beautiful expanse of white sand. After the Revolution, the beach was opened to all Cubans and the former casino and hotel became a workers’ social club.

The “Yacht” was founded in 1886 and became the snootiest place in Havana (it was here that mulatto President Fulgencio Batista was famously refused entry for being too “black”) until the Revolution, when it became the Club Social Julio Antonio Mella, for workers.

Today, as the Club Habana (5ta Av., e/ 188 y 192, Playa, tel. 07/204-5700), it has reverted to its former role as a private club for the (mostly foreign) elite. Nonmembers are welcome (Mon.–Fri. 9 a.m.–7 p.m., entrance CUC20 includes CUC10 consumo mínimo).

Havana’s huge yachting marina, Marina Hemingway (5ta Av. y Calle 248, tel. 07/204-1150, fax 07/204-1149, comercial [at] comermh [dot] cha [dot] cyt [dot] cu) is in the Jaimanitas district, 15 kilometers west of downtown.

Buses #9 and #420 run to Marina Hemingway from 5ta Avenida and Calle 0.