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Our
adventures in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus continue....
  
Finally, after that stay in Ashford, courtesy of the NHS, we arrived back home again. Margaret and Norman were waiting to collect us from the plane, which was of course almost 2 hours late.Must confess to feeling a little shattered and am looking forward to some relaxing sunshine days to build up the spirits again
Who said relax. We can't believe how much things in the garden have grown, while we have been away. Joan planted some Morning Glory alongside the water tower and now it is right up at the top of the tower and has got a grip on the gutters. That is my job early tomorrow, climb the tower and cut it all down. We also planted some Lantana hedging last March. They were then twigs about 6 inches high, now I am going to have to get the hedge cutters out and cut back hard. I suppose after another year of cutting into shape, we are going to have a lovely box hedge all full of colour
There has been a lot of secret phone calls going on since we came back. Norman, bless him, is 66 years young today and Margaret has planned a surprise dinner party at the Colony Hotel. The Colony opened early this year and some good reports have come back about the food and their Saturday night Jazz concerts, so that is what Margaret booked.The reports were correct, we had an excellent meal and the concert was something else. we can only imagine that the hotel must fly this group in from the mainland as they were really brilliant. For certain if they had been plating elsewhere in Northern Cyprus somebody would have heard and passed on the news. We all sat around the bar area and listened to the music, washed down by the odd G & T. The hotel presented Norman with a big cake and the band sang Happy Birthday. A nice touch and a very tasty cake
I have been trying to play catch up again since we came home, but this time with serious complications. I decided to upgrade my laptop whilst we were in UK to one with more power, more memory and Windows XP. Now I am very happy as a user of these things, a little Internet and E-mailing, update the website and write some letters etc., but the technical bit of transferring programs, files and other stuff from one computer to another, is something else. I am determined to get as much as possible done before Bill & Margaret arrive tomorrow night, but so far I have spent many hours and just seem to get there slowly.I seem to have got my e-mails and internet working, transferred my photo software and the picture files, but the big struggle is Microsoft Front Page which I need for the website. Maybe the version I had on Windows 2000, won't work on ME, I clearly need a technical man.So now that's my excuse for the website being so far behind, but when it is up and running, life should be easier.Whilst we were away, a new restaurant opened up in Lapta village, called The Tai Restaurant. So tonight 6 of us went there to see what it was all about. It turned out that the local owners name is Tai, so no exotic food and no misspellings, which is what we all thought. However the food was brilliant, with loads of garlic on things and a menu that was just that little bit different, definitely to be repeated.
Up very early this morning as Margaret and Norman needed to be at the airport by 6.30 a.m. Still at least I was able to spend more time on the computer problem later in the day and tomorrow our friends Bill & Margaret arrive, so we will be wanting to spend time with them over the next 10 days.
The flight from Stanstead was a little late last night, so today was a relax around the pool day to allow us all to recover.
Early evening, when it had cooled down a little, we all went for a walk down to the sea front and along the shore, passed the Aphrodite restaurant. This restaurant is run by a local and he makes the most wonderful real fruit lemonade. We sat on his terrace and drank his lemonade and Bill was very interested in his life story as he has lived all over the island and all through the problems in the 60's and 70's.
This man just runs his little restaurant, looks after his fields and his animals, whilst his sons are builders. One is a successful restoration specialist of old village properties.
Joan made friends with this baby donkey which belongs to the Aphrodite restaurant. He insisted on following us up the road and took some persuading to go back to mum. He really was cute thing and one day he may grow into his ears.
Our friend Richard, one of the partners in Besparmark Properties, had organised a day out on the same boat we used for my 65th party and the wind dropped sufficiently for us to be able to set off early this morning and enjoy the day out.
Bill and Margaret really had the good luck that this trip was delayed by a week, so where able to take the place of Norman and Margaret, now in UK.
It was till quite choppy so we sailed west out of Kyrenia and anchored on the lee side of a large rock at the entrance to Escape beach. There we were able to swim all day in water that was much warmer than our pool at present. Have a leisurely buffet lunch on board, which was up to the usual high standard of Hakan's boat.
After lunch had settled, Richard organised for the guy with the speedboat to come out from the beach and bring his banana boat with him. Three of them went off first and managed to stay on board, despite the choppy sea, then I was persuaded to go on the second run. Great fun, but you sure had to hang on tight as we crossed the wave tops. I think Joan said something like, "daft old man", but you have to try these things
Fairly relaxing day today. Took Bill & Margaret up to Bellapais to view the Abbey and have some lunch. They also enjoyed the souvenir shops up there, Margaret managed to by a cashmere pasmina for only £17 and Bill invested in a tablecloth for their garden table. Guess their luggage weight is going up for the return journey.
A lazy afternoon all round, spent by the pool but it was very windy, so for the first time in 10 days we ate indoors. Guess what, we had no sooner sat down to eat when the wind dropped.
Today we took our guests for the big climb up to the top of St Hilarion castle. It is only 746 meters and some of it is done by car, as far as the entrance. After that it is something else, there are around 1500 steps to the very top, but the view is stunning and Bill & Margaret declared that it was worth the effort
Today we all went to Nicosia, forced on us really by the fact that we had some problem with our car. It seemed to be losing water out of the cooling system so we had booked it into Maxxum's for a full service and the repair. Norman, bless him, had said use my car if you have any problems, so that was a real bonus. We were able to pick up his car. take two to Nicosia and leave ours there overnight.We took advantage of the visit to show our guests around the old town, the market area and the big Mosque in the centre of town. We also went to our favourite doner restaurant for lunch, once again enjoyed by all.We had some lovely sea bass in the freezer so they went on the BBQ tonight and were enjoyed by all
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As luck would have it, our car was repaired in time for a collection yesterday afternoon, so we were able to set off for our planned trip up the Karpaz peninsula.
As usual we had booked in at the Malibu Motel. A very simple family run hotel with the usual friendly welcome. We left our things there around lunch time, had a quick drink and then went on to Golden Beach. There we had lunch followed by a swim on the biggest, most beautiful beach, on the whole north of the island. Later we went on to the monastery and to the very tip of the peninsula. We all had to have pics taken at this remote spot, which is rugged but lovely. I imagine that it might get a bit cold and windy in the winter, but I am not thinking of going to find out.
We returned to our hotel in time to take a walk around the harbour and for Bill to take a few pictures as a memento of their visit. The final joy, was the ability to sit on the hotel terrace and watch the sun set over the peninsula.
This joy was followed by some swordfish steaks, served with meze, salad and chips, washed down with a couple of bottles of wine between us.
On the morning of the 19th, we were up early for a pre-breakfast swim and then we set off to go to Kantara castle. Joan and I sat in the car park and let Bill & Margaret climb to the top, the views are nice, but we have been up there a few times so decided to be lazy for once.
In the afternoon we went home via Famagusta. A chance to show them the old town and some of the walls surrounding it, then we took them down to the beach next to the UN demilitarised zone. Here you can walk along the beach and look at all the very sorry looking hotels which have been damaged 30 years ago and remain unused to this day. Very sad really, because these hotels could bring in much needed revenue to the island. Unfortunately also, it is forbidden to take pictures of this area, so you will just have to take my word for it, that it just looks like a war zone.
Today being there last day before going back to UK, our guests opted for a quiet day in the sun followed by a pre-booked dinner at the Colony Hotel. So there we all were, posh frocks and all out to dinner in the newest hotel in town.
A busy day for the two Gillin's today. Firstly we had to be at the airport to see Bill & Margaret off by 8 a.m. A very sad day as we had had a wonderful 10 days together and just hope to see them back again in the not too distant future.
We got home around 10 a.m. Richard came around for a swim and some lunch, then in the evening we set off again for the airport to pick up Norman and Margaret, due in at 7.p.m. Not bad really because their plane was only 10 minutes late so we all made it back to Kyrenia in reasonable time.
Am still struggling with this new computer, it just won't let me publish the website. So here I sit with a whole month's news to give to the world and I can't communicate with my host server. A bit of a bugger really, but hopefully my super tech man in UK is hot on the case and I will get some results out soon.
Today I received an e-mail from some web contacts, Lynda and Stuart Hillard, who took this fabulous picture of Lapta from the air on their way home. It must have been a very clear day and a very clean window to get this shot and when I enlarged it on my system we could pick out our house. Great thanks for sending that Lynda.
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