We had a nice breakfast in the interior courtyard at the Library Hotel. The temperature overnight dropped to 16C, it was very pleasant in the morning sitting outside.
Checked out and packed up our little Suzuki. We realized we never actually had a drink or sat and read a book in the library while we were here :(
We were moving to a hotel in the wine region today and doing some touristing along the way.
First, we backtracked about 5km to see the Neolithic ruins at Choirokoitia. There was only one other couple at the site when we arrived. I asked the rather boisterous ticket guy if they were open tomorrow (just to get a sense of what might be opened or closed on May 1, a national holiday here). They were open, but he said he didn’t want us to assume that other places would be open.
The ruins themselves are a UNESCO site, the first evidence of inhabitants on the island. It’s a 15 minute walk around and up a hill for the full view of the excavations. A nice little detour.
Then we got back on the A1 and drove to Limassol. Here it goes by the transliteration of the Greek name, Lemosos, which we didn’t know when we first arrived. Luckily we just followed google maps, and not directions to ‘Limassol’.
Our destination was the Lemosos boardwalk, which is at the west end of the sprawling city. We parked on a side street approaching the boardwalk, took a screenshot of google maps in case we forgot where we parked, and walked down.
There’s all kinds of cool coffee shops, bars, restaurants, galleries, and pedestrian walkways just north of the boardwalk. The boardwalk itself is really nice, and well used even on a weekday at noon.
For lunch, we drove about 15km west, to a beach near Avdimou, a Lonely Planet recommendation. At the end of a 2km winding single lane road is Kyrenia Beach Restaurant, on a secluded beach with nothing else around.
The restaurant staff were really friendly. We grabbed a table overlooking the beach with the sea air blowing through.
This time we remembered to ask what fish were local. Heather had the grilled sea bass and I had the fried small fish. Both were simply prepared and mmm excellent.
After lunch we drove up to our hotel, Apokryfo, in the small village of Lofou (population 300). There were beautiful views along the way of the hills and valleys. They could probably film car commercials on these roads.
Because we were coming from Avdimou, a little west of Lofou, rather than approaching from the east, there was no signage for the hotel. Instead google maps took us through back streets in the village. Twice we ended up in places ending in stairs or roads too narrow to pass, and I did some 7-point u-turns. Finally, we worked our way around the outside of the village and towards the hotel. The last stretch looked a bit iffy if I had to back up, so Heather got out and walked up to check. It was indeed the Apokryfo!
We checked into our room, which had great views of the vineyards in the distance. We also had a balcony overlooking the courtyard of the hotel.
The hotel didn’t have laundry service, so we washed just our small stuff. Jeans would need to wait until we got back to Istanbul :(
The sun was just about setting, so we went up to the rooftop to watch the last little bit of the sun. The rooftop overlooks the village, which is bowl shaped from the hills.
A couple of other guests were having sundowner, and we chatted with them for a bit. Almost all the other tourists here are from Europe, which makes sense given the proximity (and that they use the Euro here).
We had dinner at the restaurant. It’s very highly acclaimed, and deservedly so. Had some mezze, then some hot plates, and finally a goat dish. Everything was excellent. We ate far too much (again!) :)
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