Cyprus
Limassol as a base, the Troodos mountains, and the gorges around Paphos
Cyprus rewards renting something with wheels. The coast is where you sleep, the mountains are where the trip actually happens, and the two are ninety minutes apart.
The named places below are the ones worth going out of your way for, but the general rule is simpler: stop at any taverna. They are nearly all very good, so the food is rarely the thing you need to plan. The one exception is the obvious tourist-trap centre of Paphos, which is worth walking straight past.
Limassol
Restaurants
- Permentor: a Russian dumpling restaurant, and a genuinely rare thing to find outside Russia. The taste is worth the detour.
- Tio: Latin American fusion in the old town centre. Good prices, good quality, good service.
- Temari: a cheap pita chain, and a very good stop if you are road-tripping.
- Pitot: Israeli, cheap, quick, especially good for takeaway.
- Aya Cookings: amazing food at great prices.
Bars
- Last Word: an excellent cocktail bar with original, seasonal drinks and a great owner. Slightly hard to find, which is on purpose.
- Hookah Place Old Town: top-notch, if that is your thing.
Coffee
Limassol takes coffee seriously and Nomad Coffee is the one I can name without a map pin. Ask locals for the rest; the recommendations I got were all good and all within walking distance of the old town.
Day trips
- Tsakias winery: thirty minutes up into the mountains. They run a tour and a tasting for very little, and the wine is excellent and near-impossible to find in France.
- Kourion ruins: very cool, easy to reach by car, and when I went there was literally nobody there.
The Troodos mountains
Worth two or three nights rather than a day trip. Pedoulas and Kalopanayotis are good village bases, the Marathasa winery is twenty minutes from either, and the Atalanti trail loops around Mount Olympos in four to five hours. Platres puts you next to the Kalidonia and Milomeris waterfalls.
Around Paphos
- Avakas Gorge: about 8km, thirty-five minutes’ drive from Paphos, and the best walk I did on the island. Pair it with the Sea Caves on the way back.
- Paphos itself has the Archaeological Museum, the Necropolis and the Tombs of the Kings.
- Stop at Petra tou Romiou, the birthplace of Aphrodite, if you are driving the coast road.
Tips
- Rent a car or a moped through Rent2Go or Electra. Submit your driving licence a day ahead and after that the city is full of vehicles you can pick up in a couple of minutes.
- Limassol is not bus-friendly. You can walk a long way along the sea, but anything beyond the centre needs wheels.
- Lefkara is the traditional village people mean when they say you should see a traditional village.
