The weather was much better today.  Bright sunshine nearly all day and no rain after the torrents yesterday.

We set off at about 1030, driving west to Guzelyurt, on the western end of Cyprus. It’s a lovely drive through pine forests, past the amazing reservoir full of life giving Turkish water.  The reservoir is an amazing feat of engineering, and beyond that is a thing of utter beauty.  Blue, blue water surrounded by treelined terraces, walking tracks and picnic grounds.  A lovely place.

Having got to Guzelyurt we headed further south west till we hit the coast, the great bay of Guzelyurt and up to the ruins of Soli.  Soli is an ancient city dating back to the Greek period, one of the ten kingdoms of Cyprus.  There is a possible link with Solon, the Greek lawmaker and philosopher (6-7thC BC).  Most of what is visible today dates from Roman times 1st – 4thC AD.  There is an amazing early Christian basilica with beautiful mosaic floors showing a variety of animals, famously a swan and a duck, but there are also horses, goats, dogs….   It is well reserved under a roof canopy.  There is also an amphitheatre, adapted from the earlier Greek one.  The British, demolished quite a lot of it to build Port Said.  Anyway, Soli is a nice visit, with amazing views west to the sea.

We came back, returning at 2pm and then Bob and I headed out down to Kyrenia and to our favourite lamp shop.  We have been looking for the perfect lamp to hang at the top of our hallway for the last 12 years…..  Our hallway is double storey., so we needed a very large lamp to hang at the top to light both levels.  We bought some small coloured Ottoman lamps from this chap earlier this year but I had spotted he had some enormous plain glass ones too.  Anyway, we had chosen one and we picked it up today.  W won’t hang it till next May and we will have to get an electrician in, because it will be a hairy job to get it up in such a high environment.  It was very reasonably priced for the size it is – £120.  It’s truly enormous with a whole load of brass on it.  Very heavy.  Going to take some hanging.

Once we got it back, we realised we were really tired, and had a 2 hour sleep.  Sue went for a walk.  John had a sleep too but out on the terrace.  Then tonight, we met up for pre-drinks and then Bob got the bbq going.  We cooked massive ribeye steaks and also some pork shevtali sausages, and I made a herb salad.   The ribeyes  were absolutely delicious, so soft and flavoursome.   We enjoyed them with a very lovely bottle of Rioja.

After dinner we watched “Page 8”, a good spy film with Bill Nighy and Rachel Weisz.