Tuesday May 2, 2006 - Welcome to the Island Tour

This weekend included a “welcome to the island” driving tour for the new girl (“L”) who joined the firm’s group from Canada – she just rolled in last Friday. The highlight of the Saturday was definitely stumbling across a store in Paphos that sells “hot” CD’s. Since we don’t have much in the way of TV, we almost constantly have our little CD player playing. Over the past couple months our collection has gotten a bit repetitive. So at $2 a pop, we loaded up on a few more.

On Sunday, we headed to the east end of the island to Agia Napa. It is known in Europe as the “Sodom and Gomorrah” of island destinations. It is pretty much where college twenty something’s go for a week of debauchery. Per our guide book: “Agia Napa…has risen to fame as one of the world’s great dance party destinations, but there is much more than mere nightlife to this purpose-built sunshine resort. Agia Napa’s core – and the favorite evening rendezvous for partygoers – is its main square which is packed with bars and café tables. Yet only steps away from the hedonistic crowds is a tranquil oasis, the little harbor still has some of its village character.”

We were there before the big summer rush so enjoyed one of the nicer beaches on the south side of the island (“L” and I swam), enjoyed lazy cappuccino’s, and a big meze of a dinner. There is still a bit of charm tucked away behind the Bennigan’s, McDonald’s, obnoxious neon lighted pubs…

Monday was a holiday here so we had one last day of exploring. We went north across the border to the Turkish side of the island. Since the border crossings are a somewhat new phenomenon (only since 2003 I believe), guidebooks aren’t terribly clear on the process. Theoretically (in fine print on the back of our rental agreement), our rental car wasn’t supposed to cross into Northern Cyprus. We were quite prepared to have to find a taxi to cart us around in the North, but the authorities quickly whisked us through without even a bat of the eye. We were surprised how “painless” it was – the whole process took about 10 minutes, passports, buying additional insurance for the rental car…

This, being our second trip across to the Turkish side, we continue to be taken aback by the state of the Greek Orthodox churches in the small villages (which haven’t been turned into mosques) on that side of the border. Being Muslim and in somewhat poorer villages, Christian churches do not seem to get even the most minimal of upkeep.

We visited one set of Roman ruins (Salamis), supposedly the best on Cyprus and also the city of Famagusta. Famagusta before Turkey invaded in 1974 was a bustling oceanfront city; since then about half the city is deserted because Greek Cypriots are no longer allowed to live there. You could stand on the beach and gaze down along the cordoned off zone of people-less crumbling buildings. Lunch consisted of a cartload of wonderfully gooey Turkish pastries at a local shop. Famagusta also has a castle that Shakespeare’s “Othello” was from – a little Shakespeare trivia. We wandered all around the castle – into the keep, up on the turrets, into the dungeons.