The Valley of Viñales, located in the Sierra de los Órganos (Pinar del Río Province), is one of the most famous places and finest landscapes in Cuba and the Caribbean. The scenery has a dreamlike character, and the view across the valley floor with its tobacco fields and barns to the palm clad cliffs of the mogotes mountains, particularly in the early morning with mist rising, conveys a special sense of peace and well-being.

The mountainous backdrop - a spectacularly eroded calcareous coral plateau - together with the limestone pavements, native pine and oak forests, much endemic vegetation, and a valley floor producing the most famous tobacco in the world combine to produce a remarkable and fascinating place. This is a unique locality. It is not only for tourists, but also for naturalists: mycologists, botanists, zoologists, ecologists and any person who loves nature.

The vegetation of the mogotes mountains has evolved in a very special way. Even to a layman three main ecosystems can be distinguished: the mountain tops are covered in scrubby forest, a stratum of trees 5-10 m high, including palms and deciduous trees mixed in with succulents, epiphytes and climbers; the steep sides with a more open vegetation of trees, shrubs, succulents and herbs; hills covered with a mixture of deciduous and evergreen trees. All of this has produced a remarkably rich flora, with many monotypic genera, such as Ancistranthus, others of very strongly restricted distribution, like Ceratopyxis, Siemensia and Microcycas, and many interesting endemics, including: Ancistranthus harpochiloides, Anthurium venosum, Bombacopsis cubensis, Gaussia princeps, Omphalea hypoleuca, Spathelia brittonii and Thrinax morrisii. Project work. Computers were donated to the Parque Nacional, and mycological surveys within the Viñales Valley were organized (though no checklist is yet available) with support from the Darwin Initiative project Biodiversity Conservation in Cuba. An electronic guide to common plants of the area has also been prepared under the same project. CD publishing this guide is planned, and a website of the work is already available.

Surveying fungi on limestone pavements near Viñales