To say that Kurt Caz is your common travel blogger would be an understatement. The South African YouTuber has roamed the world looking for adventure and paradisiac places to be, but he’s also found himself in many dangerous situations by choice, always looking to show the raw reality of the countries he visits.
While Kurt often gets out of risky situations by using his vast experience as a tourist – more accurately a traveller – and a bit of luck, it isn’t always like that. The best examples of this are his short but controversial travels to Cuba and the Dominican Republic, where he not only featured in many eyebrow-raising situations in his videos but also put himself on the receiving side of lots of backlash.
So what happened to Kurt Caz in Cuba? What other controversies has he got into recently, and what about his fortune and rise to fame? Keep with us to find out!
Contents
Where Is Kurt Caz Now?
Since he began sharing YouTube videos in 2019, Kurt Caz has become an expert at showing the rawest side of every place he visits. Whether he’s in Europe, Latin America, or Africa, Kurt doesn’t waste time when it comes to capturing the wildest and most shocking situations on video, gaining lots of popularity and followers because of his honesty and straightforward attitude while traveling.
Nowadays, Kurt’s YouTube channel has well over three million subscribers, and has accumulated more than a billion views. His most popular videos on the platform are his adventures in suburban and commonly dangerous areas of countries such as Venezuela, the Dominican Republic, Colombia, and Brazil.
With that being said, Kurt’s fame has extended beyond YouTube to other platforms, as the casual pics of his travels have gained him 1.5 million followers on Instagram, equally matching his following on Facebook. On top of that, his TikTok shorts have done wonders to turn his face viral on the app, while making count of his followers surpass half a million, summing an audience of over seven million users across several social media.
How Rich Is Kurt Caz?
Considering Kurt Caz’s popularity and the time he spends traveling the world, it’s natural for his audience to theorize about his financial situation. According to online sources, Kurt’s fortune is estimated somewhere at over $2 million, and there are clearly good reasons to assume his finances are at that level.
While not many details are known about Kurt’s YouTube earnings, in a 2022 interview he revealed that his primary and more popular channel didn’t have sponsors, contrary to his secondary channel. However, he also admitted to having no financial worries since his video content took off, meaning that his earnings from the content, whether these are linked to his videos or products featured in it, are good enough.
Taking into consideration all of those factors and the high costs per advertisement impressions of travel channels, fans on Reddit have estimated that Kurt’s YouTube earnings could be dozens of thousands of dollars per month. On top of that, Kurt’s cost of traveling through countries with low living costs allows him to save considerable money.
Cuba Controversy
Even though Kurt Caz’s content is widely welcomed by his loyal audience and travel enthusiasts in general, that hasn’t saved him from facing controversy. To date, the biggest scandal he has been involved in is related to his stay in Cuba in early 2023, which resulted in an unexpected and not-so-positive experience not only for Kurt.
Immediately after arriving in the Caribbean country, Kurt began filming his experience in the center of Havana while visiting historical places, but difficulties were quick to arise after he went outside of the common tourist areas of the island to other places, finding it difficult to find transportation, food, and a hotel to stay the night. Some of the most eyebrow-raising moments of Kurt’s adventure in Cuba consisted of meeting scammers, illegal tobacco resellers, and sex workers, none of whom Kurt blurred their faces on video.
In the end, Kurt described his experience in Cuba as a ‘nightmare’, which was likely to result in him being banned from the country. Soon after Kurt left Cuba, his fellow YouTuber and former friend Timmy Karter went to the island as well, and affirmed that the people featured in Kurt’s video doing illegal acts had been incarcerated after his videos on the island had gone viral. Also in his video, Karter interviewed a Cuban man who affirmed that the entirety of the country ‘hated’ Kurt for his actions, well-meaning as they may have been.
The Aftermath
Right after the accusations against Kurt Caz were made public by Timmy Karter, the issue became a topic of discussion on sites such as Reddit. While there were people who took Karter’s allegations with a grain of salt, others affirmed that he was in the right, and accused Kurt of exploiting the troubled situations of people he encountered in Cuba just for hisviews.
During an interview with YouTuber and friend Martin Mulvey, Kurt affirmed that he’d ‘mixed feelings’ about his experience in Cuba, given that he had met ‘good people’ there, but the scammers and other situations had made it difficult to have a nice time. He criticized the Cuban government and the overall infrastructural and political situation of the country, while also rejecting the criticism he’d encountered about showing many negative aspects of his visit.
While Kurt didn’t address Karter’s accusations, a pinned comment on the channel written by Mulvey affirmed that no one who appeared in Kurt’s videos in Cuba had been jailed and described Karter as a ‘waffling drunk idiot’. Nonetheless, it’s up to the audience to decide who is telling the truth in this situation.
Other Controversies
It’s not rare for Kurt Caz to get himself into dangerous situations, but his travel to the Dominican Republic was one of the most memorable and controversial, because of all the problems which came with it. The first video he shared from the Caribbean island was in July 2021, when he experienced what it was like to visit a hood in Santo Domingo, and embarked on many other risky adventures from there.
Unsurprisingly, everything became more complicated when Kurt illegally crossed the border from the Dominican Republic into Haiti, where he participated in a voodoo ritual, and was scammed. Though Kurt got out of that specific situation safely, the Dominican Republic government found out about his illegal behaviour, which resulted in him being deported and banned from the country.
The situation was distressing for Kurt, who was not only accused of defaming the Dominican Republic but was also deported without proper documentation to Brazil. He got out of that situation safely but the ban hasn’t been lifted yet, making it one of his most iconic moments.
So what will Kurt Caz’s next dangerous adventure be? It won’t take long to find out!
