Cyprus

* I'm trying to play a little catch up with posting as I like to keep this as an account for myself as much as for others. 

The week after school got out some friends and I took a trip to Cyprus. It was nice to have something fun to look forward to amid the busyness of saying goodbyes at school, packing up classrooms, and packing up my house so that I could move over the summer. 

We flew into the capital city which contains a boarder into South Cyprus. I'm still a little unsure of how and if they're actually two countries and how that works governmentally but we visited both sides and saw big differences. North Cyprus is related to Turkey and looks very similar to Turkish places I've been where as South Cyprus is connected to Greece and has a much more European feel to it. 

The tiny island is covered in churches some still in use others closed up but still beautiful from the outside. We didn't have much of an agenda for the trip so we wandered and explored. It was the perfect, restful holiday. The capital city was more touristy with shops and cafes but the rest of North Cyprus was less crowded with little villages sprinkled throughout.

One evening we found a large park that ran along a small river. We walked a couple of miles along it though trees and swamps and came out next to the president's palace!

After exploring the capital city we rented a car and drove to the coast. We stopped to visit the ruins of a beautiful castle built on top of a mountain. From the windows you can see the mountains and the ocean.

Another day we drove along the eastern coast visiting tourist sites (some were still there, others had long been closed or seem to have disappeared). A few times we followed the road line on our map until it turned into a dirt road, other times it stopped completely and turned into a field! We did find one of the well-known tourist attractions; a wild donkey! Later we stopped for a picnic and to swim at the beautiful beach. It was a bit of a hike to get down to the water but once there we were one of only 2 other small groups picnicking. It felt like we were in a movie! I've never seen such clear water and exquisite views.

We swam out to where we couldn't touch and could still see the bottom clearly. I didn't realize such beautiful places actually existed outside of postcards or edited movie scenes and to think that we had it all to ourselves for the afternoon!