holidays go too quickly! (Paphos)

Member Name: west_jenn

Product:	Paphos
Date:	24/04/03 (562 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: sunny, lots to do, reasonabley priced

Disadvantages: not many beaches

I've recently returned from a week in Paphos, Cyprus and had a great time. But now it's back to work and routine. I?d have posted this sooner but my naughty computer has been playing up.

We stayed in an apartment complex just outside Paphos. Paphos is a resort in the west of Cyprus. It's divided into two nearby areas. Kato Papos is the area by the harbour and has lots of touristy shops and restaurants and archaeological sites. Ktima Paphos is very nearby and is set on a hill. It?s where a lot of civil administration buildings are and is less touristy.

There is a fairly cheap and frequent bus service that will get you around the area. The no 10 and 15 bus go to Kato Paphos and the no 11 bus goes to Ktima Paphos.

Although we had a great time Paphos does have it's downsides. Kato Paphos is touristville. There are rows and rows of tacky gift shops, garish looking restaurants and bizarrely enough loads of opticians. I was annoyed that I didnt know this and bring my glasses prescription with me I saw designer glasses from £60 in one opticians.

The harbour area in Paphos is pretty and there is a little fort like building you can climb up which gives you a lovely view over the harbour area, it's acutally a tiny part of a much larger castle that used to stand on the spot Parts of Paphos have a bit of an unfinished feel to it because there is a lot of development of villas and apartment complexes underway.

There are very few beaches for a resort of Paphos's size. Our apartment was supposed to be beachside. All we could see was sea meeting black rocks, after some searching we found a tiny cove. In the immediate Paphos area there is the municipal beach where the sand is quite black. The best bet beach wise is Coral Bay which is a short bus ride out of Paphos , it isn't a huge beach but there is sand coloured sand.

Generally speaking Cyprus enjoys a sunny climate for most of the year. In Apri
l the average temperature is about 23/24 OC (sorry don?t know how to do the proper o) rising throughout the year and then dropping to 23/24 in November.

Paphos has a number of archaeological sites which are interesting to see. The Tomb of the Kings is just outside Paphos and is easily reached by bus. The entry charge is very reasonable. Despite it?s name no one royal was buried just prominent local sorts. The tombs date from about the 3rd century BC. They are a series of bizarre underground holes edged into the ground along with impressive underground pillars, You can be all Indianna Jones exploring the different tombs. It?s very scenic and set by the sea.

Another site is the Paphos mosaics down by the harbour in Paphos. The entrance fee is again very reasonable. Within the site you?ll find Roman ruins with extensive and sometimes amazingly preserved Roman mosaics.

Car hire in Paphos is very easy to do, there are loads of different car hire outlets. Cypriots drive on the left hand side of the road, which made us more inclined to hire a car. It costs roughly between £12 and £20 a day to hire a car, our car hire firm put about £22.50 on top of that for a full tank of petrol. A hint would be to try and take it back as near to empty as you can.

We went up to the Trodos mountains. These are mountainous ranges in Cyprus that rise to a Mount Olympus which is 1952m and the highest point in Cyprus. They get snow up there (there was a bit of snow lingering when we went up there) in the winter and there is a small ski resort that operates until the end of March. The views are absolutely stunning, it's good to get out of the big resorts and see some of non tourist Cyprus. The Trodos mountains are easily reached by car from Paphos. You don't have to go far out of Paphos to start going up the mountains and reaching Mount Olympus only takes a couple of hours.

We went self catering, so I can't really comment so much on food
. There are lots of restaurants in Paphos, although if you?re looking for something authentic you may have to look quite hard. We had a brilliant week. Cyprus is a great place with lots to see and great weather, but Paphos doesn?t have many beaches!

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