Saturday day in Larnaca

 On the second day of our short break, we drove over to the village of Pyla. This is an interesting village because it is situated in the UN buffer zone and still has a mixed community of Greeks and Turks. On the mountain top at the rear of the village sat Turkish military out look post that overooks the border.

We wandered around the small village square which has a mosque and The Plyla tower which was apparently built by the Venictians in the middle ages.

 We then popped into the Platia taverna for a coffee and were impressed by the  bar  in inside. They also had a chatty parrot named Rio.

We then drove over to the village  of Lefkara which sits on the lower slopes of the Troodos mountains.  The village  is famous for its lace and silver work.  

We wandered around the narrow , picturesque streets  and stopped off to buy some hand made biscuits which had the local lace patterns iced on them.

We then headed back down to the coast and made our way to Dhekelia beach where we stopped off at the Mer bleue fish restaurant  for a lovely lunch.

In the evening we returned to Larnaca and took a walk over to the old pier over looking the marina.  

We had a quick drink at the bay  tree before a visit to The Tudor rose bar.

This turned out to be something of a surprise as we sat in a lovely courtyard  and enjoyed  a meal and a glass of wine.

At the end of the  night,  the local football team, Anithosis, won the Cypriot football cup final. From our balcony we could see thier local stadium as  fireworks exploded into the air for hours on end. In  the streets below us the fans cars poured along the seafront sounding their horns and letting off flares in celebration.