Cyprus: Limassol
The sunny beach of Limassol!
Hello! After a long hiatus from travel blogging I AM BACK! I have been living in London since the Fall of 2010, attending graduate school, and I have another blog which is dedicated to my London experience soon to come: Londinner.com. I will also add something about London to this blog.
I have had some other small travel excursions since I moved to London: a weekend in Paris, a hellish 36 hour return flight to the US during the snow dusting of Western Europe in order to have much needed friend and family holiday time, and a class trip to Belgium. However I have chosen my next two trips to include on the blog: Cyprus and Spain. For the second week of April I am spending the week in Cyprus with my roommate, M. We will be staying with family friends in Limassol and visiting various places around the island and relaxing. The reason I decided to visit Cyprus is: the possibility for good weather/beach, the Byzantine icons, and Meze (Turkish/Greek/Syrian/Lebanese/axis of evil version of Tapas…see my Turkey posts for more on this). Also I enjoy the family friends we are staying with so that was another reason to visit!
Limassol: Day One
We arrived in Limassol/Lemesos late in the evening on the 5th of April. After enjoying a fabulous welcome meal of ratatouille and spanakopita made by our hosts we slept soundly and awoke to a sunny day! It was about 74 degrees and we promptly put on shorts and decided to take a leisurely walk to the old part of town.
We are staying in a flat about a mile or so away from the old town of Limassol, located next to an orange juice factory called Kean. The facility simultaneously exudes the pleasant aroma of oranges and the undesirable odor of decaying fruit, depending on which part of the apartment complex you are in. Luckily the flat we are inhabiting is positioned in the former category. So after a very nice breakfast (oh yes, Greek yogurt) with our hosts we headed on a long walk down to town. Also, like Turkey, Cyprus is a Cat Country…which I am a huge fan of.
The oranges popping out the the roof of the Kean Factory. Apparently there used to not be a roof at all!
View of the mountains from our host's flat.
There is a very nice promenade along the beach which we were able to take full advantage of. We walked as far as the Medieval Castle and decided to scope out eateries. My first impression of Limassol is that it isn’t terribly aesthetically appealing. It is a mix of decaying older buildings with some personality and new developments that largely lack a soul. There is a very large and wealthy Russian population here so there are then many buildings and shops that reflect a more Russian mode. There is a small pedestrian shopping strip along St. Andrew Street that has souvenir shops and a few nut/olive oil/Cypriot food product shops (which I will return to to buy large amounts of nuts and dried fruit to cart back to London). The old town is a network of narrow streets where most of the (older) structures are covered in a layer of ocher dust that one would expect of a Mediterranean seaside town. There are not many white buildings like there are on other Greek Islands. Limassol has a Turkish part of town which we didn’t explore much. After exploring various side streets to check out the cafes, bars, and eateries to which we may return at another point in our stay, we ended up eating at Meze Taverna. It was one of the first small, seemingly authentic Cypriot restaurants that we passed. Which, as it turns out, is one of the better restaurants for authentic Meze in the city. (Read more about this in the Cyprus: Food post). It was excellent and SO MUCH food.
Classical Statue, Mannequin, and Human on St. Alexander Street in Limassol.
A bike repair shop in the old town
Trompe l'oeil doors and windows on St. Alexander Street
After lunch we slowly made our way back up to the flat. We walked on the beach enjoying the sand and surf on our feet. Oh, it has been so long! We stopped for coffee at the Limassol Nautical Club, located right on the beach across the street from where we are staying. We then returned to the flat and spent the evening relaxing with our hosts.
This man is pushing a stroller in a speedo.
Ahh....the beach!
