Some years ago, there was a streaker in the Tour de France. The race was coming up the Champs-Elysées when he decided to join in. Only without a bicycle and without, it was quickly noticed, anything else. In Anglo-Saxon countries, streaking is either deeply shocking or one of the gentle pleasures of summer, according to your stance on morals and perhaps the physical shape and sex of the streaker. In France, however, streaking is virtually unknown. At the same time, public nudity is pretty common, at any rate on beaches, and so the French television audience had to have it explained that taking your kit off and running wild at sports meetings was quite the thing in less well-behaved countries.

Many things mystify the French about culture in English-speaking nations. I tried a while back to explain the concept of a Bad Taste Party. When I had covered what I thought were all the main points, my friend still looked puzzled and finally said haughtily: "Of course, such a thing would be impossible in France."

The greatest bad taste in the world is Richard Branson's pullovers. You won't know it yet but such pullovers are to be banned by law. The only question is when, because I have still to come to power. But rest assured that they will be.

I mention this because we are flying to Cuba by Virgin. Virgin Airlines is a part of the Branson empire that is still left to him and the wretched man will persist on jumping on every publicity bandwagon and pulling on one his Fair Isle sweaters and exposing his oat-eating teeth at us to get us to buy tickets from him. I am happy to fly on his airline, since by and large the planes get through, but I have made it a condition that I do not have to sit next to him.

We (Mrs Léo and I, thankfully, rather than Sir Richard and I) fly out of Toulouse early evening on January 26, a Saturday. Thanks to the clock change, the time will barely have altered by the time we plunge down upon Gatwick airport to the south of London. We spend the night there in one of those soulless hotels that cater to people who don't really want to be where they've ended up, then entrust ourselves to Sir Richard the following morning. There are so many clock changes between Britain and Cuba that I've long lost touch with what time we can expect to get in.

So far as I can see, Cuba is a long thin island that has its best bits at each end. Havana is most of the way up towards the top and there are lots of pretty bits between there and Miami, which looks awfully close on my map of the world but probably isn't at all. Then in the middle of the island are all the wheat fields and, I suppose, the tobacco meadows and the sugar mines. Along the southern edge of the island runs a road said to be "like Big Sur but with cactus". Which sounds pretty good because my friend Bernard ("A frog hops across America") raved about Big Sur when he finished his ride there, whereas I had never heard of it.

Then in the south-east is a lot more beautiful countryside, although strongly three-dimensional, with the Guantanamo American prison down on the coast. I learned the other day that the Cubans reckon their deal to rent America the land has long expired. When America keeps sending a cheque, Cuba sends it back.

How much of it we see depends - of Cuba generally, I mean - depends on many things. Steph isn't feeling wonderful at the moment and so we may start with short distances and a lot of sitting on beaches apparently plucked from paradise. This won't raise any immediate objections from me. It's about 26 degrees in Cuba this time of year; this morning here in France it was only three and cold fog clung to the hills.

Well, then, that's it. I'm sorry about Richard Branson. Please take it on yourself to entertain him should you meet. But remember to pack sunglasses against those awful sweaters.

Hasta la vista!