Agia Napa

Since Andrew is still recovering from his harrowing experience at the airport, I thought I would help him out and post some pictures of the day.  We visited the ancient church/monastery in Agia Napa.  It is now surrounded by nightclubs, restaurants, and shops.  We then headed to Nissi Beach, also in Agia Napa.  Nissi beach is a bit of a party beach, so a younger crowd than other places.  The water is shallow for a long way out, and you can walk out to a small island where some of the young guys like to jump off into the water below.  It seems it takes some encouragement from their friends for them to get the courage to make the jump.

Now that is a big tree trunk!

Andrew climbing stairs to nowhere

Kadi inside the monastery area

Behind each door is a room of the monastery

View from the church of the courtyard

This looks like a good place to read up on the history

While you thought I was in the bathroom.

Today's blog is written by me, Andrew Fauble about my very first experience in Cyprus. I was walking through customs when two men approached me. They began to start asking me about some very delicate information, I had to get them to stop. "No hablo ingles," I stated as I waved them away. They nodded and  a few seconds later a guy with darker looking skin walked in, you could tell he was Spanish. "Hola," I stared. "Me llamo Sergio. Soy de Espana. No hablo ingles." " Hola," He shot back. "Buenos tardes," I replied. He started speaking Spanish quickly and rapidly, a language I could not really understand. I had no other options, so i began swinging and flailing my arms in an X shaped pattern. "NO HABLO ESPANOL! NO HABLO ESPANOL!" I yelled it over and over again. The two men were there and quickly grabbed my body and drug me into a small room off to the side of the building. There was nothing in there but a dim light and five men. I had to act before the interrogation games brought my vacation to a grueling halt. In an instant I elbowed the man holding me in the face, knocking him to the floor. At the same time I began to swing my arm into the exact location another man was pulling out  his gun, knocking it out of his hand and then following through into his face. I threw the rubber match I always keep in my pocket to a pack of live gun powder. In the guards brief reaction of fear I had half a second to think before anyone else could act against me. I was in an airport, so if I acted in a way in which to set me free and get out of the room, security would swarm around me making true escape hopeless.  I needed to find a much more isolated place. It would also indirectly affect every civilian in and around the place. So I cocked my arm back to a position to punch the next man, and as he flinched backwards I rested both my hands into a position where he could handcuff me easily. They brought me to a police car with an officer in the drivers seat and riding shotgun. They both had Glock pistols. I was placed in the middle of the car. Their first mistake. The middle seat created a blind spot for both other occupants for anything below my lower chest in the single mirror. It also  created a total blind spot of the peoples vision unless they turned completely around.  The car was an older model which had been converted into the current cop car it was. That told me the interior was mostly made of metal, much heavier and less fuel efficient then newer more plastic body cars. Mistake number two: Nothing was holding me except the single pair of handcuffs they had originally put on me. Mistake three:  Taking me on a bare road in the middle of Cyprus towards a jail with nothing but a helicopter watching over us. The fourth mistake: Tinted windows. A watching helicopter is useless they can't see what I'm doing inside. I was ready to make my move. Using the sharp part of the handcuffs combined with my strength, I easily was able to penetrate the thin layer of the seat and get to the metal inner frame. The whole time staying out of view of the two cops. Using more of extraordinary experience picking the cuffs lock on the metal  was as easy as cutting a hot knife through butter. I kept my hands below their view and slightly scooted over towards the drivers side. In a flash I used my dangling handcuffs as a whip smacking the man in the driver seat directly in the face. Blood spilled out as my opposite hand (my left) was already wrapped around the drivers neck and chocked him hard until his arms stopped grabbing towards his gun. I moved my hand onto the drivers wheel and moved upfront while keeping the car steady the whole time. I had to continue towards the prison or the helicopter would know something was up. When I got with in sight of the prison the chopper started to begin the process of landing. I could barely see the group of people waiting for my arrival through a fence. No one was paying attention or glancing. I took a left out of their sight in front  of a thick concrete wall. I was absolutely concealed  now. I crept along the wall until I found a drop off area where the wall was only ten feet high. I climbed over it with no problem and hopped down. There was a back exit where cars exit that I made my way to. There was a patrol car about ready to leave on an assignment. I crawled behind a car kicked open the door. The man  looked up and by then he was in the back seat unconscious. I dove my way into the car and followed them to the city. At that point I was free. So my fun new and exciting trip to Cyprus could finally have a proper beginning.

We're HERE!

Hi!  It's Kathy and I'm the first guest blogger for the trip.  According to Lori, everyone is required to take a day, so I'm getting mine out of the way:)  I'm also doing it because it is almost 10:00 and I'm wide awake!  Usually I'm winding down for the day, but the time change has thrown us all off a bit.  We have an annoying habit of waking up at 2 a.m. and not being able to go back to sleep without a little Tylenol p.m.
Everything has been going good, and today we started some serious "touring."  Because of the size of our group, we need to take two cars and are divided into two teams:  the boy team and the girl team.  Of course the girl team is better, but the boy team is doing an excellent job leading us to all the sites (thanks Demetris).  The streets in the towns are very narrow, and of course they drive on the "wrong"side.  I'm not quite as jumpy as the first day when I swore we were going to crash into cars head first because we were in the wrong lane!
We spent today in Larnaca, which is the southern part of Cyprus and about an hour from our beach villa.  It is also the city we flew in to, and is located right on the Mediterranean Sea.  We started at the Hala Sultan Tekke Mosque, which was founded in 647 A.D, by the aunt of the prophet Mohammed. She died in Cyprus during an Arab raid (fell off a mule).  Next we headed to Ayios Lazarus Church, but since it was lunch time it was closed for two hours!  We headed on to the old Larnaca Fort and out to a lunch (gyros) before heading back to the church.  The Church is named after Lazarus from the Bible.  You may remember that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead.  After that, legend holds that he moved to Cyprus where he preached the gospel. His remains are said to have been found on the island and moved to the church, where they remain.  The church was beautiful, with many pictures of saints lining the walls.
Our final stop was at the Aqueducts that were originally built by the Romans, and rebuilt in 1745 by the Turks.  As Andrew commented, 1745 isn't very old for here!  It was used until the 1930's.  We then headed home for a swim in the villa pool and wine and pasta on the patio.

Cheers to Fed!

One other note, as tennis fans we could NOT miss Wimbledon.  Usually it's Breakfast at Wimbledon, but this year it was Beers at Wimbledon, since we watched in a bar starting at 4 in the afternoon.  Most of us (sans Kadi and all the British tourists around us) were thrilled to watch another Fed win!

Cats were sent to Cyprus many years ago to kill the snakes. You see stray cats everywhere.  We like to stop and make friends when we can.

We needed to be suitably dressed in the church, so had to wrap scarves around our shorts.

Aqueducts

More Americans in Cyprus

My family has arrived!  They landed on Saturday with a serious case of jet lag. We will be staying close to Protaras which is a popular beach/tourist area. Saturday we had a wild time in the pool at our villa and then watched the sun set over the water from a cliff by Cavo Greko. The sun was a beautiful bright orange globe. Sunday morning Demetris forced us to get moving early and head to the beach. We went to my favorite beach, Konnos, which is set in a cove. Our afternoon was spent in a bar watching the Wimbledon final. Good to see Federer win. We had a birthday party around the pool in the evening to celebrate all of them at once since it isn't easy to mail packages overseas. I've asked all the visitors to write a blog while they are here so hope you will hear from them soon. Might have to wait until they are in less of a fog.

Fun at the pool at our rented villa

Grandma and Sofia

Sunset at Cavo Greko

It was a bit windy

Poor Andrew feel asleep while we were watching tennis

Grandma and Alex at Konnos beach

Troodos Road Race

Demetris participated in his first race today and what a race it was!  He is a pretty avid runner so when we saw a flyer for a 15K run in the Troodos Mountains it sounded like something he would enjoy doing. On the website there was a small course map and it mentioned that the first three kilometers would be uphill. We drove to the starting point the day before to allow Demetris to practice that incline. He came back saying it was tough but he would be able to manage at a slower pace. The next morning prior to the race the organizers described the race to the runners. After the initial steep incline, the remainder was to take place on a fairly rough trail. Surprise. Even better, there would be two uphills so steep that they recommended only walking those points. Basically they would run to the top of the mountain and back down. The downhill was no cake walk either. It followed the ski slope trail and the runners had to zig zag down to stay in control. Demetris managed to not only finish but to maintain almost the same average pace he usually runs. He took a few tumbles (okay four) and banged up his knee pretty well, but hung in there. I think that's great. While he was running, the kids also ran in their first race. It was 800 meters and all the kids got a t-shirt and a medal for participating. Sofia was a little mad that it was a "boy medal", only picturing boys.  We were dead last (I went with them) but Sofia decided she was too shy to do her best running and Alex kept stopping to wait for us. Plus, they were the youngest in the small group. The race I wanted to do started at the same time as the others so my turn is next!

Nice and clean before the race

We can race, too.

Proudly showing their medals

The final turn.  Slow down so I can take a picture, please.

Dirty and bloody crossing the finish line

OUCH!  Medical attention for the bloody knee.  He wasn't the only one.

Hot in the City

The temperature in Nicosia has been up around 100 degrees this week. In fact, a few days ago the high was reported to be 106. The sun is intense but the humidity remains fairly low so for me it is tolerable.  Along the coast the temperature is a bit lower.  Luckily, we have the pool and the beach to cool us off.  We spent the weekend at beaches in the Protaras area. Saturday we met up with Diana and family and Sunday we joined Themis and family. Demetris and I were able to get in some snorkeling which we both enjoy. We wish we could stay all day, but our main goal is to not get fried. Alex is like his dad and getting pretty brown. Sofia is our little toasted marshmallow.  She's pretty white to start with but beginning to get a bit brown.  Happy Father's Day Demetris!

She's a booger

Alex and Nayia

Burying Demetris

Electra and Nayia take a turn getting buried

The Wave

Last night was Tatiana's end of the school year celebration. All of the kids in her grade put on a show with the Mediterranean Sea as the theme. Tatiana was in a group of "waves". There were also fish, sailors, etc. It was a very nice program, at least what I saw of it. We got there a bit early to get a seat and then the principal spoke for thirty minutes before the program started. Our kids were really excited for the first half hour of the show, but after that they decided they had been sitting long enough. I took them outside to run around which was okay by me because it was plenty warm inside. We capped off the night by going out for pizza.