Wednesday 16th May

Up reasonably early to consume our strange mixture of foods before catching a bus up to the intra state bus terminal for the 10.30 bus to Limassol. One thing Cyprus does very well is to run the buses on time & at about 10.29 for the princely sum of €4 each we set off on the 1 hour journey. The bus terminated at the new port outside a most impressive but absolutely locked up cruise terminal building with no toilets available. Another old couple went looking but weren't allowed in & our 2nd bus to Larnaca left them there to sort it out themselves.

Bus no 2 to Larnaca took about 45minutes to clear the straggling beach front passing some huge hotel complexes en route.

We felt quite at home back in Larnaca where we had started & arrived back at our first hotel at 1.30 only to find reception closed at 1pm. Luckily the cleaner had our key so we could move in.

Lunch, a bacon sandwich & 2 frappes', iced coffees, was had next door. One of the great loves of Cypriots is to put cucumber in just about any meal & so the sandwich was liberally loaded with it, much to Dick's disgust.

We walked down to the small fishing harbour and saw the fleet of traditional wooden 30ft boats of very solid construction. On our return journey we tried homemade lemonade which was truly refreshing & watched about 6 planes in 45 minutes, approaching the airport, presumably bringing in more tourists to fill the hotels.

Had a passable meal & turned in fairly late by our standards.

Thursday 17th May

d*** was expecting an easy day but after breakfast, we walked towards the tourism centre & found a remarkable private archeological museum housing items from 2000Bc until the middle ages. Some of the ancient ceramics were quite extraordinary in there design & state of preservation & a lot of work had gone into curating the collection.

From there we visited the tourism centre as planned & secured a bus timetable for tomorrow as the local bus goes to the airport right past our door.

After a coffee & a rest we set out again to catch a bus to Agia Napa about 45 k east of here. The ride was through new country but much of it was through high rise hotels & apartments on the beach front. The town was very ho hum but at the bus stop was a lovely little monastery which house an icon which was hidden in a cave when the Arabs raided in the 8th century.

Leaving the monastery we walked down towards the little harbour had a beer then visited a Museum of the Sea. The highlight here was a reconstruction of a ship sunk in 302BC where about 70% of the structure was visible. This single masted merchant vessel had been built in the early 20th century & had sailed in the Aegean for several years before being put in the museum. The rest of the exhibits weren't too special but the ship was a true gem.

We caught the next bus back to Larnaca & had a more interesting dinner before retiring.