{"id":23197,"date":"2018-06-27T20:19:21","date_gmt":"2018-06-27T19:19:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/?p=23197"},"modified":"2018-06-28T05:51:35","modified_gmt":"2018-06-28T04:51:35","slug":"holiday-in-cyprus-4-famagusta","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/?p=23197","title":{"rendered":"Holiday in Cyprus (4): Famagusta"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On the second day of the northern part of our Cyprus trip (Wednesday), we drove from Kyrenia all the way to Famagusta on the eastern coast of the island which took just under an hour and an half. Originally built by the Phoenicians, the city was totally enclosed by ramparts by the Venetians and these ramparts still survive today. Part of the city is a ghost town &#8211; a section once occupied by Greek Cypriots who fled their homes when the Turks invaded in 1974. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Our first visit was to what was originally St Nicholas Cathedral which was constructed between 1298-1312 and used for coronation purposes for the Lusignan kings of Jerusalem and Armenia. During the Ottoman reign, however, it was converted into a mosque &#8211; since 1954<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>the Lala Mustafa Pasa Mosque &#8211; and remains a mosque to this day. I have previously visited a place which was a great mosque and became a cathedral (La Mezquita in C\u00f3rdoba) and a place which was a basilica<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>which became an imperial mosque which became a museum (the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul), so I am used to religious changes in this part of the world. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>After a stop at a well-known patisserie for coffee and cake, our next visit was<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>to Othello\u2019s Tower, so called because Famagusta was supposedly the setting for Shakespeare\u2019s play (the name was given during the British occupation). This citadel was originally built in the 12th century during the Lusignan period to protect the harbour. It is thought that, when Leonardo da Vinci visited Cyprus in 1481, he advised the Venetians &#8211; who by then had taken over the island &#8211; on the design of the defences of Famagusta. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>At this point, we left Famagusta and made the short drive to Salamis, the site of the greatest of Cyprus\u2019s ancient cities. Founded more than 3,000 years ago by Mycean Greeks, it dominated the island until its near destruction by earthquakes in the 4th century AD. Most of what we see today is 4th century: the Roman theatre, the columned courtyard, the gymnasium, the 44-seat latrines, the frigidarium (cold rooms), the caldarium (hot water baths), the sudatorium (sweating rooms).<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>We walked around Salamis at the hottest time of the day at near to the hottest time of the year, so I was kitted out in sun hat, sun glasses and sun lotion. The expression \u201cmad dogs and Englishmen\u201d came to mind.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>Fortunately lunch was at an outside restaurant very close to the ruins overlooking the azure sea.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Our final visit of the day &#8211; again only a short drive &#8211; was to the site of the catacomb tomb of St Barnabas, a native of Salamis who evangelised Cyprus. Since 1756, it has been the Apostolos Varnavas Monastery and, since 1974, the monastery\u2019s cells have become northern Cyprus\u2019s main Archaeological Museum in which Bronze Age pottery items are the star exhibits.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>For the third consecutive evening, dinner was at the hotel as part of the package and what we lacked in choice we enjoyed in quality. We all had the local fish and we all liked it. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On the second day of the northern part of our Cyprus trip (Wednesday), we drove from Kyrenia all the way to Famagusta on the eastern coast of the island which took just under an hour and an half. Originally built by the Phoenicians, the city was totally enclosed by ramparts by the Venetians and these [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-my-life-thoughts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23197"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23200,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23197\/revisions\/23200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}