Cyprus with Mandy | FindPenguins

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Trip start
January 17, 2026
Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
Day 1 Brum to Paphos
January 17 in Cyprus ⋅ ⛅ 15 °C
So early start 4:45 alarm and 4:55 reminder! But up doing and Uber’ing to the airport by 5:15. And that was easy 25 mins and cheap too only £14 inc tip. Bag drop was efficient but security took about 35mins & at thats at 6am in January - must be hell in summer. Quick breakfast in a Peaky Blinders themed bar and then on the plane. All smooth left & arrived on time - mostly cloudy but a long clear stretch over the Julian Alps.
Swift passport control but slowish bag service and then on the bus. Jet2 much clearer than Easyjet about the whole thing from bag drop to hotel transfer. We were first off the bus 20 mins later too.
Hotel is very licky - luggage taken as soon as you arrive while you are ushered to a sofa and brought a drink and the check- in form. Nice person explains the hotel stuff to you.Personal letter to welcome you to the hotel as part of the hand over process.Then to our room technically ground floor but at the back its first. Nice room - seaview, balcony, couple of tub chairs and a table for scrabble. Luggage arrives and the man enquires if we have got on the wifi and down loaded the app ( perfect for dad!).
Out for a walk to see the sea and the dramatic skies before sunset - 4:45 flight and 2 hr time difference mean it was late afternoon when we were sorted and in our room. Its a flat walk all the way to Paphos harbour but we just walked to inspect the beach and then about 15 mins towards town. Many, many feral cats - Mandy counted 25 on the way back to the hotel!
Then to dinner with some minor pre dinner mincing to look at excursions. Interesting buffet - Peruvian night tonight but enough I could eat. Then a beer and bed. But first we had to order an extra quilt and master the shower ( waterfall, overhead, full in your face, same but crotch height and up the wall!) Then we realised there was a turndown service - chocolates and bedside mats plus the curtains drawn! Enough - to sleepRead more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
Paphos and a Sunset Swim
January 18 in Cyprus ⋅ ☁️ 12 °C
Mixed weather - a tremendous storm overnight, what sounded like an explosion woke us at 2am. I thought Trump was up to no good! Turned out to be ‘just’ thunder and it didn’t last long. Wet still at breakfast but it improved, we went to the archaeological park where the sun shone and we admired the mosaics and sketched the lighthouse. Then we had a quick wander around the harbour but didn’t pay for admission to the castle which is tiny! We went to Mr Steve’s cafe, the sprucker assured us that the somnolent cst on a chair was Mr Steve the fat cat boss! So we had cypriot coffee & hot chocolate and some dips we then walked back to our hotel in the rain. Some planning, reading and downtime and then a sunset swim for me which Mandy kindly volunteered to stay dry and record. Hoping salt water is a miracle cure for scabby skin! The water felt cold but once in it was ok and the air temp was only about 14 degrees so no warmth to help when you got out!Read more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
Tomb of the Kings
January 19 in Cyprus ⋅ ☀️ 12 °C
Woke to blue skies and sunshine though it clouded over during breakfast.
We hopped on to the bus to get to the tomb of the kings. This is a huge site that functioned as s necropolis for around 700 years ( 3rd C BCE to 4th C CE). The name is misleading; the archaeology suggests middle management burials not kings. It is though, a vast site, much of it lost when the area was quarried. That which remains varies from small niches to Doric columned catacombs and even some horned altars associated with the worship of Isis and Seraphis. The sun came out and it was warm and sunny for a while.
We spent some time here wandering and sketching but then the sun retreated and we decided to go and look for Paphos old town. This was an uninspiring walk, either romantically you could say it went through the last bits of countryside before meeting the city but also it was treacherous pavements through abandoned agricultural land; decaying greenhouses and untended fields.
We arrived at a glass elevator which took us up to signs for the agora so we started by heading for the market which operates every day according to the guidebooks but all we found were shuttered frontages which could be stalls maybe. We then looked for the area google maps described at the old town but what we found was mostly vacant units. But there were some ornate rotting/ rusting balconies which suggest the building were quite old. We then found the municipal park but it weirdly smelt of wee and so we decided to head back to our books and the beach.
This too was a bit dispiriting, we trotted down some ropey stairs and then through some urbanish areas for some while and after a bit we decided to walk to the bus instead.
We did this via a local bakery ( lactose free chocolate milk - yay) and a supermarket where we found a pistachio creme liqueur.
Eventually we found the bus stop but it was unclear if it was ours - the signage is unclear snd after much slightly fractious fluffing we abandoned and decided to walk to the harbour where we knew the buses. A stop for a hot chocolate and a fizzy water improved matters snd then we bused back to the hotel.
A nap and then Cyprus night in the restaurant which was very good for me - 2 lots of mousakka 😋.
Then back to write diaries and get our stuff together for tomorrows trip outRead more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
North to Turkish Cyprus
January 20 in Cyprus ⋅ ☀️ 12 °C
Early start - 7 am alarm as today we’re off on an excursion to Famagusta, Salamis and Varosha. So early breakfast and outside the hotel by 8:15.
Our tour guide Eva grew up in Northern Cyprus and became a refugee in the war of 74. So interesting to hear her perspective, she must be 60ish - the last generation of Greek cypriots born in the north.
She told us tales of the invasion ( during which her father was killed) and a potted history of the island up to that point. All horrifying and interesting and subtly anti muslim biased - the comments about the Ottomans etc. i suspect it plays well to about half the coach population who are reform types!
Also she quoted numbers ( of turkish settlers in the north, snd greek cypriots remaining in the north) which were surprising and wiki suggests were questionable. Obviously the Turkish invasion was an act of aggression and many people were killed or displaced. Eva’s father was killed and she was separated from her family. Awful.
But little nuance in her telling of causes and / or the ottoman history of Cyprus. Reading to be done!
Mostly ( entirely ?) cauli heads on the coach and some entirely expected fun overhearing to be done ( complaints about building noise at hotels, husband / wife interactions that were amusing and the worlds worst hat!Anyway first stop after a wee stop and crossing through into the North via a British military base ( much less exciting than it sounds) was Salamis, which I remember as a big site but we just had a flying visit to the theatre and the gymnasium.
Then to Famagusta, the walled city, we had hoped to walk the walls but there was were only a few access points not an accessible circuit. We looked at the former cathedral of Famagusta a classic gothic build which when the ottomans took over in the 14th c was converted to a mosque. So flying buttresses and pointed windows but the bell tower was replaced with a minaret, various dide buildings removed and the interior was stripped out.
We had an interesting walk around Famagusta looking at old buildings and a very interesting short chat with a woman from London who was a Turkish Cypriot who asked if we were being told how terrible the turkish people were…..
Then on to Varosha / Varossi which in 1974 was a tourism hotspot favoured by the ruch and famous but became a bargaining chip in the post ‘74 discussions on Cyprus’ future. So now it is an abandoned town with crumbling hotels and shops .
Then back to the bus and the long haul back to Paphos - we got to the hotel around 7:20 pm.
Long but fascinating and left us with many questionsRead more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
Driving round Cyprus
January 21 in Cyprus ⋅ ☁️ 12 °C
Today has been a drive through history. We picked up our interesting hire car ( sat nav stuck somewhere in Japan, its menu in Thai), weird card reader installed in the footwell and some out of date japanese stickers. Very rattly snd tinny but in expensive and arrived at the hotel before 9am. The sat nav which beeped alarmingly at frequent intervals and offered helpful but highly inaccurate spoken instructions such as ‘ensure you are heading in the right direction’, ‘night is falling put the headlights’ on and ‘you are approaching a railway crossing’ ( not in cyprus!)
Anyway we had a great day.
First with the Neolithics at Choriokoitia where as well as the remains of the settlement there are some reconstructed Neolithic,pre pottery, round huts and quern stone. In among the remains are many saddle shaped grinding stones and containers painstakingly hollowed out of the rock. There was a replica quern you could try and it gave a sense not only of how hard work it was but also of what the soundscape would have been for the people who lived there; grinding and chipping sounds Plus the wind in the trees and the noise if the bird life.
We then decided to head into the hills on an optimistic trip to the tiny church of Agios Mamas which was said to have good frescos. Its was a lovely windy drive into the hills snd eventually we found Louvaras ( up in the foothills of the Trodos mountains) and down a tiny road church, the but it was locked tight.
There was a note on the door saying if you want to visit phone one of these people and of course I would have just left but Mandy said she would phone! Tried all three - no reply, Mandy was persistent, she heard the sound of sawing at s nearby house and went to talk to the bloke there to see if he had a key. He didn’t but he came and picked off a likely name and phoned and so Andreas came to unlock the church. While we waited Mandy chatted him and discover more pieces for our divided island jigsaw. He was conscripted into the army after school where they were shown films and information about the 74 invasion to presumably fill them with righteous patriotic fervour. So he said he had no interest visiting if he has to show idea and pass s checkpoint to go to somewhere he sees as his own country.
Anyway eventually Andreas arrived and opened up the church. Tiny but every space was covered with frescos dating from 1495. Including one showing the patrons who paid for it all. Absolutely stunning.
Then finally we headed back out of the hills to the Roman settlement at Kourion. By now it was blowing a howling gale and there was no visitor centre as it was all being refurbished. But easy to navigate with signs and a good view at various points. Interesting but Mandy didn’t see it at its finest snd we were frozen by the time we got back to the car. Chugged back to Paphos with the car still offering an unhelpful commentary.
Back in time for Italian night in the restaurant and the hosting book-group even more remotely than usual!Read more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
To Nicosia / Lefkosia
January 22 in Cyprus ⋅ 🌧 11 °C
Today was wet and windy ( fortunately though we didn’t hear the extreme weather warning) so we drove to Nicosia aka Lefkosia.
A bit of an exciting drive - blowy over a couple of the viaducts, also a petrol stop where there was a bloke to pump the petrol for you!
We’d identified a parking place and set Waze so a pretty straightforward drive in and then we were just 3 mins from the museum.
The Cyprus archaeological museum is great, not a huge museum but excellent. All sorts of stuff from really old 7000 years BCE to roman remains.
Some of the most amazing items are the figurines including stylised figures from Choirikiotia and later figurines from a Cypriot figurine stash a little reminiscent of The Terracotta Army. Which seem to have been largely shipped to Sweden under some dodgy deal.
We spent a happy morning ignoring the classical statuary and exclaiming over the various figures then we visited the cafe. Which did a lactose free hot chocolate 😀. Whilst we were there there was a demonstration of some sort which came down the road, we enquired what / who/ why. The response was the South Africans ( about what - no idea) but the blokes said there had been another demo the previous day by Iranians but South Africa had more people so had won! Then one bloke turned to the other and said why are they protesting here? To which the other replied ‘because parliament is just there’ pointing over the road!
Then to the shop for a chopping board with a copy of a plank figurine on it and a magnet for the fridge.
Then back into the museum to do some sketching. We spent a happy afternoon doing sketches of our favourite pieces before heading back at about 3:30. I wanted to be back as far as possible in daylight especially given the weather.
Then back for Traitors and Gourmet Night - which was a bit tricky eating wise but Mandy procured extra gravy which made it easier.Read more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
The photos that didnt fit from Nicosia
January 22 in Cyprus ⋅ 🌧 11 °C
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
Swim and laze
January 23 in Cyprus ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C
This morning was warm and sunny so we decided we’d go for a swim. Chilly again and Mandy didn’t stay on very long but I stayed longer and really enjoyed it. Back to rinse and change and back to the sea. I then spent the rest of the morning reading by the sea & Mandy spent it finding interesting stones and other bits and turned it into art 😀. In the afternoon it turned cloudy and showery so we drove up to Polis to look at the little museum. It wasn’t a long drive but quite misty and wet.
I had been to the little museum with Paddy and everyone in 2018 and it obviously doesn’t get many visitors because I turned a few pages and there was Paddy’s entry from 2018.

Then we walked down to the square where there was a large church. Fairly modern but interesting. Covered in wall paintings and with a big basket of leavened bread waiting on the altar- very different from a post counter reformation catholic let alone C of E or other Protestant church.
Then back the way we came past sulphur springs which could be smelt for quite a way! Back at the hotel we gave the key up to reception and said farewell to the tin can with interesting sat nav - deffo a holiday hire not a uk car!Read more
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Cyprus with Mandy Traveler
Last Morning
January 24 in Cyprus ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C
Wet and stormy overnight but just grey and damp by breakfast. Sea too rough to swim given the rocks just under the surface.
After a slow start we packed up and deposited our bags in the luggage room. Then we went out for a wander in the hazy almost sun. We turned left rather than right and almost immediately found a tiny church very new - built in 2013!
Once in side there was nothing to indicate it hadn’t been there for 300 years - ikons, wall paintings etc.
we carried on wandering out of the hotel stretch following a really quite muddy path and down to the sports area where there were young children learning to sail ( quite rough for that) and adults learning to play volleyball. We mooched and enjoyed the sun that was finally out before turning back and heading to get the bags, all the while enjoying the sun and the sound of the rough sea.Read more
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Trip end
January 24, 2026