Nicosia and crossing the UN border

Today we visited the capital of Cyprus, Nicosia, and crossed the UN peacekeeping border into the Turkish side of the island.

We started our day with coffee at a local cafe, and then headed to Nicosia. Cyprus was divided by a UN buffer zone following conflicts in 1964 and 1974 between Greek and Turkish Cypriots following their independence from being a British colony. Ultimately there was a Greek backed coup in 1974(aimed at uniting Cyprus with Greece) and a following invasion by Turkey of the northern part of the island. Neither side could win a decisive victory, and the UN stepped in to mediate, drawing a line across the island on a map, with that peace keeping border going directly through the middle of the capital city of Nicosia.

We parked on the Greek side, and then walked to the peacekeeping zone where there was a border station. After showing our passports on the Greek side to Greek police, we then did the same on the other side with Turkish police. Crossing the border was indeed like crossing into Turkey, as everything felt like Istanbul as soon as we crossed! There were vendors selling things like baklava and Turkish delight everywhere, and even the architecture changed. We learned that the architecture is different as Cyprus was conquered by the Ottomans hundreds of years ago(taken from the Venetians), and it was really interesting to learn about how many centuries the island has been fought over.

We walked all over the Turkish side, and checked out the buildings and vendors. The highlight was visiting Büyük Han, which was a caravansarai, or a special inn unique to Islamic culture that has an outer wall surrounding an inner courtyard(with rooms in the walls). We also checked out the old remnants of Venetian rule, which included a remnant of the old city wall and gate.

Once we’d had our fill of the Turkish side we crossed back to the Greek side for dinner, and then headed back to our Airbnb to pack.

We took a break after packing to walk the salt lake near our accommodation, and take some awesome pictures. Afterwards we walked the waterfront and grabbed some tasty local sorbet. After that we called it a night, tomorrow we fly to Jordan!Leia mais