Thursday, 3rd February, 1994

We had left cold rain behind us as we headed South on our Cyprus flight to Paphos. The passengers were a relaxed lot, mostly Greeks and I noticed that the smoking section had been extended. Ralph and I were sitting across the aisle from each other and on my right was a sun-tanned woman in her mid fifties with wavy blonde hair and long bright red finger nails.

As she was on her own I started talking to her. She had a voice like Zsa Zsa Gabor, silky and skittish and she fitted perfectly into the category of the 'idle rich'. Whether her exuberant life style was inherited from husbands or family I had no idea. She lived partly in London (Kensington) and partly in the Seychelles. She had two children who, by the sound of it, were too indolent for their own good. She had traveled the world with unspecified companions - to Pakistan, Malaysia and Thailand to name but a few.

She said that the cost of living was too high in the Seychelles because of the 'leftist government'. It sounded OK to me. There seemed to be good health care and a good standard of living. But she railed against the fact that there were also public sports arenas, libraries, et al. I felt like saying, "Hey lady, perhaps you'd prefer a banana republic where the rich keep their money and children die on the streets." But I didn't because she was a nice lady and a political sermon from me wouldn't have changed anything.

I had started to read Lawrence Durrell's "Bitter Lemons of Cyprus". He arrived on the island in the 1950s by boat from Venice. What a wonderful way to arrive. I hope at least to be able to compare notes with him, posthumously, of course.

After landing, we sorted out our hire car, not more than a red tin box really, and drove the  15kms west into Paphos, passing concrete supermarkets and pockets of wasteland to the coast and plumped for the Imperial Beach Hotel with its anonymous modernity and marble vestibule, its sea frontage and our room with a view. We had a short stroll along the beach under overcast skies and rested awhile before sallying forth for something to eat.

Friday, 4th February

Ralph is swimming in the rather magnificent indoor pool and I am using the time to pour over the map and work out an itinerary, first to explore Paphos and then North to Polis and the Akamas Peninsula in the North west of the island.

The weather is overcast. According to the CNN weather forecast it is the same all over the region.

Last night we looked for a Taverna in the concrete jungle of roads and hotels west of Paphos but ended up in a Mexican restaurant where we had a reasonable meal and a pleasant local wine. An old man came in selling lottery tickets. He goes from bar to bar and takes a small commission when there is a winner. A strange livelihood but he had a dignity about him, shuffling from table to table proffering the lottery slips and then sitting down to rest awhile at a corner table. Ralph did a sketch of him.

Notes on the day:

The Artists Pub on the waterfront at Paphos Harbour. Have just visited the orange stone Fort. It has changed over the centuries from Roman fort, feudal castle, Turkish tower to a warehouse for salt. It was run by the British and is now a tourist attraction.

From Ayios Neophytos - northwards across scrubby foothills, terraced vineyards, many overgrown, ramshackle huts and shacks perched on hillsides with chickens scratching for food at Stroumbi. An old lady in black bends over a grass verge hacking at the undergrowth. Panoramic views of the mountains. Patches of bare chalky soil among the crags. An ancient village across the valley called Theletra. The houses are the colour of dun. The windows appear to have no glass in them and stare emotionless across the patched landscape. Down a dirt track we see abandoned vines, olive and almond trees. The almond trees struggle to produce a few pink blossoms. We cross two bridges. Our premonitions are correct. The village is deserted, maybe a Turkish village that had to be abandoned after the Partition of the island.

In Theletra we ate our picnic of bread, cheese, tomatoes and wine by the scarred church with its shattered yellow stucco walls and its tower, the bell now gone, overlooking so sadly the vista of hills below. The village appeared to have been abandoned in a hurry. Doors gaped open and houses had been despoiled with pickaxes and graffiti. The arched ceilings and small courtyards, though, proclaimed that its inhabitants lived simply and with dignity. Some of the ceilings had beautiful wooden rafters, others gaped to the sky. An iron bedstead had been dragged into the middle of a room with piles of clothes on the floor, testament to some awful upheaval. Images of war torn Bosnia could not help but come into my mind.

After our picnic we walked away from the damaged beauty of the church to the other side  of the village where ghosts hid from us in the dark corners of shattered rooms and dank alleyways. I didn't want to stay any longer. I felt as if I were intruding on these ghosts and I waited anxiously while Ralph took his final photographs of the ruined village. He was affected too and said he didn't feel like doing any drawing there.

Driving away from the village we passed an old man on a donkey and leading another. He grinned as we passed. There were patches of bright yellow flowers.

Back on the main road northwards there were plantations of orange trees. They looked as if they had been painted by a child or a naive artist. The oranges polka-dotted the dark foliage. The trees had been manicured into symmetrical ovals and cast shadows across the light green grass beneath.

At the Monastery of Ayios Neophytos we explored the 12th century Englistra (or hermitage) which was built by the theologian Neophytos with his own hands. He hacked it out of rock to make a tiny chapel and cell. The walls curved inwards and were covered with frescoes painted in a primitive and vigorous style. The Monastery had a 15th century church with more frescoes and icons in rich gold and umbers. The decoration was refreshingly unsophisticated, from the bishop's painted chair to the angels' heads carved on the wooden doors.

The Cloisters of the Monastery were pristine, the old stone scrubbed to a creamy yellow and corners for the monks to meditate. There was an aviary and well-tended trees. Two monks passed by, portly and red-faced. They swung past in blue serge cassocks. As the guide book said, " this quiet religious enclave dominates a peaceful wooded slope." It didn't mention the modern villas with satellite dishes and swimming pools that scarred the winding mountain approach.

We took a right hand turn outside Yiolou to the Sulphur Springs but the baths were closed as building work was in progress to add more rooms to the bath house. Across the road stood a stone chapel. Inside there was a higgeldy-piggeldy arrangement of religious artifacts, elaborate candlesticks, a richly decorated altar piece and old gold iconography.

From Polis we arrived at the seaside resort of Lachi, home to the manufacture of sponges (so the [1] guide book says). It consisted of a short row of boxlike cafes and souvenir shops. The seafront was wide and clean and we admired the shingle beach and the sea which was leaden under darkening clouds.

Westwards we drove along the coast where the landscape was greener with pale meadow grass, orange plantations and terrain that sloped more gently than in the hinterland of steep ravines.

This gentle terrain was appropriate since we were nearing the Baths of Aphrodite, past small apartment buildings with names like "Love Nest" and "Aphrodite", of course. At the approach to the baths visitors had to run the gauntlet by passing an orange seller. He wore a hat the same shape as that worn by Makarios and a blue gown which was a shabby version of the ones worn by the monks at the Monastery. He wore his hair in a long black pigtail. His stall stood under the shade of a carob tree and was piled high with plastic bags of fruit. He offered us an orange in his outstretched hand, then deftly he peeled it with the flourish of a conjuror doing a trick. We had seen several people carrying bags of oranges to their cars. We bit into the juicy segments that had been offered but didn't buy.

The approach to the Baths took us along a sub-tropical track with exotic trees, purple cyclamen and brilliant ferns on the wayside until we reached a natural spring protected by dripping moss-covered rocks. Here Aphrodite used to bathe in order to rejuvenate herself. It was a secluded and romantic spot and would have been a suitable background to a pre-raphaelite painting with its clear water and the deep green of the trees.

On the way back we passed the orange seller's stall and again he proffered a juicy orange, his brown face smiling at us in an ingenuous way as if the last thing on his mind was selling oranges. But we bought a bag. He gestured to me to sit down, gave me a branch laden with oranges, took one himself and sat down beside me. He nodded at Ralph's camera and smiled benignly while the photograph was taken. Then he picked up a scrap of paper with spidery writing in blue biro. It was his address. I duly sent him the photo when we got home so that he could add it to the growing pile he must have already received.

Saturday, 5th February

The sun is shining. I am sitting in the courtyard of the Chateau de Covocle, originally a Lusignan fort and then converted into a Turkish manor house and now a museum to the Cult of Aphrodite. It was around here, among the farms and fields of the village of Kouklia that shrines were built and re-built sporadically from the late Bronze age to Roman times.

We had set out from Paphos traveling East along the coast road, hoping to make the Museum of Folk Art our first port of call. It was closed. The building was a traditional 18th century Cypriot villa with 'handsome wooden balconies', to quote the guide book. It was once the home of Andreas Zimboulakis who was the British consular agent for Paphos.

We pressed on to the Sanctuary of Aphrodite, the centre for worship of this most important of  goddesses. Here grew an ancient city that had flourished around the shrine. First we visited the Museum where we sketched in the courtyard after our visit to the exhibition rooms. They housed a wide range of artifacts from Grecian pots, Roman glassware, bronze age utensils to quaint figurines made out of clay. A medieval vaulted hall stood below ground with narrow windows and stone heads looking down from the points of the arches.

The ruins of Aphrodite's shrine were extensive. Massive stones and columns gave the area a haphazard symmetry. It was a pleasure to wander here in the balmy sunshine. Beyond the ruins, set on a lower level was the Katholiki Church, its yellow walls bathed in the morning sunshine. It stood inside the remains of a cloister of arches. The roof of the nave was long and rounded - a medieval nissen hut in shape. Above the dome sat a simple stone cross. It was locked. So we missed the Byzantine wall-paintings, including one of the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers represented as heads issuing streams of water from their mouths. That I would have liked to see.

Further along the road was a kiosk where we drank revolting luke warm Nescafe before taking a passageway under a road to the beach. Strange rock formations reared out of the sea. One, I'm not sure which, is called Aphrodite's Rock. Legend has it that she was born there.

From the road to Limassol we took a sign to Pissouri Beach with various jokes about piss-ups, etc. Here we had our picnic on an old wooden bench. At first we were dismayed to find an immovable rubbish bin in front of it. But the view of the glittering sea and the waves lapping on the sand compensated us. We ate salty Cyprus cheese, olives, sesame bread and a local wine.

Further along the road we came to the ancient shrine to Apollo Hylates (Apollo of the Woodlands). He is one of the most complex of the Olympian gods for he was god of many things - beauty, music, prophecy, archery, protector of trees, of flocks and birds. It was set in what was once an old deer forest but now a shady enclave of pines and shrubs of profusely flowering blue Rosemary. The colonnades, old gateways, courts and dormitories had survived to proclaim their functions. The ruins had exposed the functional parts with ducts and cisterns exposed and the under-floor hot air systems for heating the baths. An inscription read that the baths were constructed in 101 -102 A.D.

By now it was mid-afternoon so we decided to look for a hotel in Limassol, losing ourselves for a while in the outer suburbs before dipping down to the sea front where we found the Amathus Beach Hotel, a haven of peace and surprisingly good taste when compared to the conglomeration of cheap hotels, cocktail bars and souvenir shops further along.

We ate dinner in a cafe (I won't honor it with the title of restaurant) for the food was pretty dreadful, though cheap.

Sunday, 6th February

From a grassy sward above the Yermasoyia Dam, north of Limassol, were two views, one to the river of the same name and the other a valley to the foothills of the Troodos Mountains. This was our picnic place.

We had spent the morning on the hotel beach, its rattan umbrellas the same beige as the sand and an out-of-season atmosphere which reminded us of scenes from the film "Monsieur Hulot's Holiday." We had the beach to ourselves except for a few of our compatriots, most of whom were northerners. They were stuffed into tight shorts, short-sleeved shirts and sun-tops. They kept themselves to themselves though they were to be seen huddled in small groups for a morning drink or evening cocktail. They shared an instant camaraderie with one another having taken the same flight together from Manchester or Leeds. They said good morning to us politely or asked Ralph if the water was cold when they saw him swimming.

While we ate our picnic above the Dam we could survey the landscape. On a flattened hill opposite sat a house that looked as it had been put there yesterday with a bright red tin roof and shiny white walls. It sat in a cement compound littered with oil drums and surrounded by a grill fence and guarded by a barking dog.

The precipitous road which snaked its way crazily up the mountain sides commanded vistas of steep gullies and canyons of rock, brush and pale green firs with dark cones on the splayed-out branches. Halfway up a terraced gully a corrugated shack balanced precariously on a narrow shelf. Between the rearing hillsides chains of mountains would appear to hump across the sky in a primeval retreat.

At Dhierona we stopped to sketch the village and its backdrop of mountains. We passed several such villages, each with its domed church and ramshackle cafe with plastic chairs under canopied balconies. The march of progress was evident in the new concrete houses straddling out from the village squares. Each had its lemon or orange tree and plant pots made from disused oil cans. Flowering almonds lent their fragile tracery to the harsh backdrop of rocks and cliffs which softened the scene.

From Arakapas we took the road back down to Limassol. The road bent abruptly as it traced our descent. Beyond the mountain peaks and folds the sea gleamed in the distance. The sun lent the water the sheen of molten gold. Grey ghosts of ships poised motionless on the surface. Soon our route softened into orange and lemon plantations, the fruits like miniature suns against the dark leaves.

We drank a coffee in the hotel bar and decided to stay here till Wednesday when we'll head back to Paphos.

In the evening began our search for dinner. We decided upon the Assos Restaurant. It looked the same as the others we had passed except that it didn't have the garishly-lit menu sign like the others. It seemed more discreet. I chose stuffed vine leaves and Ralph had stiffado ( a stew with onions and wine). Our waiter was young and spoke excellent English. After we had eaten he started to talk to us. He was a vain young man who preened himself like a bird getting ready for a courtship dance. When we told him where we had been that day, he declared, "Ah! You passed by my village." Then he brought a map to the table to confirm the fact - and a faded black and white calendar with a picture of his village. We had indeed passed nearby. I asked about the abandoned villages. He shrugged his shoulders and said they were either Turkish villages, especially if painted in blues and greens, or the results of an earthquake which seemed unlikely to me since the damage looked more man-made than natural.

Our host asked what Ralph did. I told him he was an artist. That was stupid of me. For then Aked (that was his name) sat down, tossed his head back and demanded to be drawn - in spite of Ralph's protests that he was on holiday. It turned out to be a great drawing, encapsulating the naive vanity of the man. Needless to say, he was not happy with it, too self-absorbed to recognize himself is my theory! Even so, he asked Ralph to draw the waitress as well, a girl from Serbia called Marignana. She complained that her nose was too big. But they gave us a house brandy and we arranged to go back on Thursday for a specially prepared kleftika.

Monday, 7th February

The Amphitheatre at Kourion (called Curium by the Romans) stands on a bluff overlooking a wide stretch of coastline. The Amphitheatre had been reconstructed and faces the sea. A herd of goats passes by on the hillside behind us, their bells tinkling. Behind the theatre is the Roman Villa of Eustolios (built about 400 A.D.). Eustolios chose this spectacular site sharing the same views as the theatre. He built baths here and as we picked our way among the creamy hewn stones we stopped to wonder at the simple things - the pipes and conduits for drainage and the remains of the water heating system. Sheltered under make-shift canopies were floor mosaics, mostly in fragments, but two were in tact. One welcomes the visitor with an inscription that reads: "Enter ... and good luck to the house." There are delicate birds and fishes in pale blue and pink on one mosaic and on another a depiction of the God of Creation, called Ktisis. It was a treat to see it in the place where it belongs instead of a museum.

We picnicked on the beach at Curium under gray skies on the steps of a beach cafe closed up for the winter. While we tucked into our bread and cheese we gazed at the waves as they clambered and receded on the sand bars. We were sheltered from the wind by the cafe walls. On our right loomed tall round-topped cliffs, the yellow rock ridged by the weather, the same rocks that must have been used by the Romans to build their elegant cities and villas.

On the road to Paphos we stopped at a parking space opposite a fenced-in archaeological site. Inside the fence a man in blue overalls was carefully cementing a gap in an ancient wall. He looked up as we looked over the fence: "It's closed, but you can come in if you like." We opened the iron gate and watched his handiwork as he smoothed the rendering with a small trowel. He was English. He told us he had been working on Cypriot sites for over four years. The entrance fee to the island museums and sites (50 cents, increased recently from 25 cents) helped pay for the excavation work, renovation and maintenance with a little help from donors. The money was shared out from a central fund in Nicosia.

18 months ago they discovered a tomb and in the third and bottom level had found a set of 42 pieces of Roman pottery in perfect condition. It was still being catalogued. To render the walls the man was using part lime, part earth and a tiny bit of cement for binding. In the past restorers had been cavalier about their work, sometimes using old pillars to fill in walls and very rough cement. He told us that the tiles that were stacked on top of one another for the under-floor heating were called 'bats' ( of great interest to Ralph who insisted that I mention it in my diary - and so I have!)

This site was, in fact, the House of the Gladiators, so called because of two magnificent mosaics of gladiators in combat, beautifully preserved in those soft ochres and blues that blend so well with the stone work. The gladiators are armed with daggers, shields and helmets and are thought to represent the gladiatorial games at the Kourion Theatre in the 3rd century A.D. This was the house of a wealthy patrician and there were also baths, storage rooms and domestic areas built around a central courtyard.

We walked up the road to another site built in the 5th century, the Cathedral Church of the first bishops of Kourion, probably built by Zeno who represented the Church of Cyprus at the Council of Ephesus in 431 A.D. Here again the site had an imposing position overlooking the sea.

On our way back to Limassol we stopped at Kolossi Castle, a sturdy 15th century fort built by the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem to administer their sugar plantations and vineyards. Above the stone stairway at the Eastern entrance was a fleur-de-lys escutcheon, the coat of arms of Louis de Magnac, Lusignan Grand Commander of the Order of St. John. From the top of a steep spiral staircase we had a grand view of fields and citrus plantations and also of the long curved roof of the Knights' sugar refinery.

All this classical and medieval input had exhausted us, so we ambled back to the Amathus to drink a sweet dark coffee before preparing ourselves for the evening.

Tuesday, 8th February

This morning's sunshine was quickly obliterated by dark clouds, a stiffening wind and rain - rain that Cyprus rarely sees in such quantities. It is after breakfast and we have decided to do some writing in our room before we drive into Limassol. This is the weather for neither mountains nor sea.

We sallied forth yesterday evening into a blustery gale and drove west towards Limassol choosing a restaurant by the edge of the crashing waves. 'High Chaparral' and 'We Specialize in Fish' proclaimed the neon-lit notice-boards. At first we were dubious about our choice since in the darkness the interior looked similar to the bleak shacks that clung on the mountain terraces inland. But the patron ushered us through the doorway in such an efficient manner that we could only follow him inside. Indeed he looked like a hospital orderly in a starched white smock and trousers, white leather shoes and white socks. He had a strong lean face and sudden bird-like movements. With his thick black hair and black moustache he looked like Groucho Marx.

The dining room was a reflection of the patron's personality: Tables with check table cloths with melamine plates upside down on them, photographs on the walls of jolly customers and portraits of dogs and faded curtains at the windows which rattled in unison with the storm outside.

In the middle of the room was a blackened fireplace and at the end an eccentric group of objects arranged like an altar in a church - a large china dog, a fish tank with a live pigeon roosting on the top and a model of a large fluffy Father Christmas in an aero plane. Crude oil paintings of horses and women's faces were stacked against a wall (the patron's work, we were to discover).

We sat at a table in an alcove created by the large food storage unit. Behind Ralph's chair a curtain hung from a wire between the wall and the cabinet. Piles of blankets were stacked there and white cooks' uniforms hung neatly on hangers. It was later that we realized that this was a bed for the dogs - for there lay a beautiful white and coffee-coloured collie dog.

We sat and watched while our host lit the fire with pieces of chipboard for kindling and paraffin that 'woofed' alarmingly when he set a light to it. He was talkative and told us how his chimney had caught fire and had been spotted by a customer just in time. As he talked, he darted from place to place, organising the dishes, tearing up more board for the fire. With one movement he leapt for the cabinet and produced two silvery pink fish on a platter. "Very fresh", he said.

He disappeared into the kitchen while we watched the fire blaze and the smoke billow from two large holes in the brick work which made our eyes smart.

Then followed the 'fire episode' with Ralph trying to plug the smoking holes with pieces of cardboard and me saying "Oh my God, do something" and Ralph saying in a dreamy vague sort of voice while inspecting the sides of the fireplace: " It's red hot in there. Don't know what it'll do to the bamboo ceiling" and me saying: "Tell him! Go into the kitchen and tell him!"

We watched the roaring chipboard ejecting flames over the lintel as the patron hurried in with a bottle of water which he squirted into the corners to stop the fire from spreading. He did this at regular intervals during the evening. I think I went into a state of shock because I can't remember the sequence of events except that our salad, humus and delicious grilled fish was set before us and a friend of the patron arrived with his wife and his wife's friend. They examined the contents of the food cabinet and chose their fish. Our host talked alternately to us and to his friends about his dogs, fetching a photo from the wall of him and his dog, telling us: " I love my dogs more than my wife." "My son won't work. He is terrible. He do nothing. Sometimes he help me. Yesterday he help me. The police chief came with my lawyer (a very high up lawyer). It was after church (a memorial service for General Grivas of EOKA). They eat. Sometimes people won't wait. I am in kitchen on my own. It take a few minutes. Four table left. But no worry. I thank God. Every year the priest come. I give him ten pounds for the church. "He carried on in this vein, telling us stories of the priest coming and him explaining his philosophy of life to the priest which seemed to add up to a combination of astrology, superstition and crossing himself three times every so often. The priest never came again.

The dog appeared from behind the curtain and another dog padded in from the kitchen and there ensued a great performance of showing us the tricks they could do. We even had to watch the patron kissing the pigeon and vice versa. The pigeon was reluctant to do this!

We had a discussion about Cyprus wine. He told us that the big conglomerates have bought grapes and land from the villagers but now the villagers were beginning to form co-operatives and produce their own wine. On our paying and giving our host a generous tip (it had been marvelous entertainment) he gave us two bottles of wine.

That was last night. This morning we strolled to a wonderful archaeological site within sight of the hotel - the ancient city of Amathus. A rough path parallel to the road and the sea led us first to a vantage point where we could look down on the agora or market place. Elegant spiral columns surrounded a large square of flat paving stones. A young man was playing plaintive tunes on a flute. We put some coins in his hat and picked our way among the ancient stones. Under a canopy lay heaps of carved stones with geometric lines and patterns carved into them. At the far end we marveled at a circular arrangement of round basins. What were they, we wondered - communal toilets or, as the leaflet said, 'a valaneion' meaning a bath complex for taking a shower. There were also two steam rooms and two small pools as well as three large water reservoirs. They thought of everything.

Beyond stood another temple to Aphrodite. This ruin affected us more than the others we had seen. We sensed an aura of sanctity and timelessness as we paced across the expanse of mellowed stone with the flautist's simple music in our ears.

We drove to the old port area of Limassol, an enclave of narrow streets surrounding the 13th century castle. We could see similarities to Kolossi. The square keep and the ramparts were built of limestone. As always with these buildings it had several occupants over the centuries - the Lusignans, the Venetians and the Turks. It contained artifacts found all over the island - bronze oil lamps from the 6th century, Turkish copper plates, pots and inscribed tablets (one pertained to a Rabbi of the 5th century) and medieval armor.

As picnic time approached we drove to the Akrotiri Peninsula just south west of Limassol. It was here, according to the guide book, that the traces of hunters of pigmy hippos have been found, the earliest human presence on Cyprus. The area was dominated by a large salt lake hemmed in by sand dunes that divided it from the sea. The guide book mentioned that pink flamingoes could be seen here between October and March but we didn't see any.

The landscape had a surreal quality, as did the approach road, skirting round the industrial port before turning south to the narrowing tip of land. The water grasses on the edge of the lake etched patterns on the scalloped surface of the water. Our valiant tin can of a car had to take many dips and hollows, puddles and ridges on the water-logged road. Behind us the sea-spray haze had turned the port area into a misty Turner water colour. Ahead of us the narrowing peninsula was also receding into mists. The land was all sand-coloured with grey and white pebbles stippling the beaches as if someone had been doing some artwork with an airbrush. The salt lake looked no different from the sea except for the tufts of reeds that broke the ripples on its surface.

That evening we ate at the Assos restaurant as we had arranged. Aked was waiting for us, [1]obviously relieved that we had turned up, though he was a little abrupt. But he had lit a cozy fire and by the end of the evening several tables were occupied making for a pleasant atmosphere.

Wednesday, 9th February

Today we found a winery at Ayios Avrosias, had a tasting and bought five bottles and then stopped ata modest cafe by a garage. Inside framed photographs created a frieze around the walls. They were portraits of Archbishop Makarios, General Grivas, the Greek Royal Family, Queen Elizabeth and [1]many others - political figures involved in the conflict that eventually divided the island. In the corner a fire blazed and locals chatted animatedly. On the wall bear our table was a mural of a river, a little white house with a blue door, trees and ducks. A middle-aged lady in a blue pinafore said we could have chops and chips for lunch. It sounded good to us! Her husband, the proprietor, brought us a copy of a magazine called 'Cyprus Life' and dated 1989/90. And showed us an article with the headline "A Woman of Courage". She was called Angeliki Soleriou. Her coffee shop became the centre of resistance for the EOKA liberation movement where secret messages and codes could be passed on. She hid guns in baskets of fruit and her cafe was often searched by the British. She was brave. The British hanged the revolutionaries that they captured. A framed magazine on the wall behind us confirmed this. It consisted of photos of faces with rewards that could be claimed on their capture - the amounts ranged from £5,000 to £10,000.

The food was cooked by the daughter and was simple and delicious. Succulent chops, an aromatic salad and chips with Avrosias wine. The old man saw our interest in the pictures around us. It was a shame we couldn't talk to him but he shook Ralph's hand warmly and kissed me on both cheeks.

Back in the car we back-tracked to Kato Kividhes, having caught a glimpse of it in passing. A steep gully of green terraces scattered with yellow limestone ruins culminated in a parchment coloured church with a red dome. It seemed too good to miss. So we left the car at a Bauhaus-style war memorial and walked down a track to the church. It was surrounded by a huddle of derelict houses and had as its backdrop the purple and brown mountains. We had the feeling that these houses had been abandoned less violently that those at Theletra. It is true that there were broken doors and shattered roofs but we didn't feel the guilty voyeurism as before.

I slid open the rusty latch on the church gate and was surprised when it responded to my push and surprised again when Ralph pushed open the wooden door of the church itself. There were folding wooden pews stacked against the wall and the religious furniture and accoutrements were positioned in a strangely makeshift way. On our right was a primitive shrine constructed from pieces of plank and painted bright blue with reproduced icons in garish gold. There were fragments of cheap cloth for curtains, incense burners suspended from lengths of string and shelves littered with spent matches and empty plastic bottles. A tin pulpit was supported by a spiral staircase that looked too fragile to climb. In the middle there was another wooden shrine with a gerry-built contraption for hanging incense burners. Behind some shabby curtaining was a makeshift altar. The sunlight sent patches of gold through the arched windows.

Turning a corner below the church we came upon three donkeys cropping the grassy verge. One trotted towards us and lifted its oversized head. It looked at us with its honey-soft eyes before modestly bending earthwards to nibble at the bright grass.

We sketched and then clambered back to the car to continue our circuitous journey back to Paphos. We climbed ever upwards towards the Troodos Mountains as far as Ayios Nikolaos, through an ever-changing landscape of mountains and rocks with gnarled stumps of wintering vines, the grey green filigree of olive trees, pink flowering almonds, a herd of brown long-haired goats urged on by a dark-faced shepherd, herds of slim sheep with delicate triangular faces reminiscent of the terracotta figurines found at Kourion and Amathus, villages where a bow-legged old woman in black leather boots hobbled with her shopping basket, a group of old men with faces like leather sat in a cafe - and so it went on until our route took us down again at Ayios Nikolaos to meet the River Dhiarizos where the landscape changed.

We were low on the valley floor with emerald meadows, feathery poplar trees, the glinting river snaking and dividing and rejoining itself. There were quiet villages, margins of reeds and water flowers, orange and lemon trees. Where the fields sloped up from the river, grey rocks reared. What a difference the river had wrought on the landscape - all those bright greens and soft contours after the sombre tones and harsh perspective of the mountains.

I haven't mentioned the two museums we visited at Limassol and Kourion - artifacts spanning the Neolithic, bronze and iron ages through to Greco-Roman. We loved the ceramic pots with figures of women on the spouts, the terracotta figurines, soldiers on horseback, chariot riders and women being helped by their handmaidens to give birth - also the preserved skeletons of a man, woman and child huddled together at the impact of the Great Earthquake of the 4th century.

We checked into our new hotel called the Paphos Porto Hotel overlooking the fort. It was cheap and cheerful after the comforts at Amathus. We ate at the Castle Restaurant by the harbour.

Thursday, 10th February

We checked out of the hotel and walked along the curved sea-front and bought yesterday's Telegraph which we read on a bench with the sea spray splashing on the sea wall.

One of the remarkable aspects of this area is the plethora of Greek and Roman sites, many waiting to be excavated and ranging from fenced-in piles of stones and broken columns to painstaking reconstructions (as in the Curium Amphitheatre). Behind the fort at Paphos a fenced-in slope contained an amazing concentration of antiquities. Here were the remains of Roman villas and their mosaic floors preserved under barn-like canopies with wooden walkways above them. We could look down on the 'tesserae' of brightly coloured local stone in natural hues with orange, green, yellow and blue glass added. The House of Dionysus had mosaics depicting the God of Wine on a chariot drawn by two panthers. The Villa of Theseus, the House of Aion - housed a rich panorama of peacocks, lions, gods, kings, birds, fruits and flowers.

Out on the road to the airport we decided to try the Folk Museum again. This time is was open and just in time for us to shelter from a heavy rain storm. The stone villa with its inner courtyards, low roofed out-buildings and curved wooded balconies was an ideal situation for a museum dedicated to the life and crafts of the people. Each room had a different theme - the making of ropes from hemp and flax, the picking and preparing of cotton, pottery, basketry, the shoe-makers bench with shelves of 'lasts', the implements of the saddlers and blacksmiths, agricultural tools, the wedding couch and the embroidered hangings of the bridal bed, the bread basket suspended from the ceiling with thistle on the hook to prevent the mice from spoiling the loaves.

We had time for one more picnic before our flight. As I conclude my diary we are sitting on a pebbly beach with the sun and the wind for company.

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