29 Oct 2007

I left Cyprus for my rotation at work and I am enjoying some internet once again. Our home phone is getting so much closer. Now for my gearhead buddies some shots of my bike and our car. 1992 CB400Sf and 2002 HRV both Hondas. Both ideal for the roads of Cyprus. Narrow steep at times and frightening threats from other vehicles at every corner.

Oct 27th 2007

Busy week here in Cyprus. We hosted our first dinner party and it was great fun. The local expat friends we have met in our village make a great fit socially and plenty of chuckles were had all night long. Later in the week we were invited back to Margeret and Jed’s for another fine evening of food, wine and merriment.

The Weather here has been bizarre for us anyway. In all of our time here, we have had less than 2 hours of overcast, and about 30 seconds of light sprinkles at around 1 AM once! Daytime highs have been around 26 all month and we both went for a swim again today. I leave for work in a few days so Laurel will have to brief me on the first flooding rain of the season – should it happen.

My bike arrived on Tuesday and I had a grand time all week riding it about. The highlight was a late afternoon cruise with Laurel up the winding village roads to a mountain village 22Km NE called Dora. The scenery was fantastic although the paved goat trail was a bit of a distraction to say the least. It is definitely challenging riding and requires a patient and slow approach to the many corners. The bike, a 1992 CB400sf Honda “Super four” is a quiet smooth and nice handling bike for the short freeway runs to Paphos as well as the twisting side roads and occasional dirt trails. I will get some photos out soon.

The next big event as you can see is our tour of the Mosaics in the Town of Paphos. The Roman site included an Odeon as well as a giant estate with many Roman baths, Banquet rooms and Temple halls. The excavation work has still much to discover but what has been exposed is terrific. The construction of Stonework and rooms that were once lined with marble mark a time when this area was truly of considerable size and wealth. We have now two books on Paphos and for those of you planning to see us, we suggest that you either get a copy of some at the library or start digging through the internet as the more history you can read before you see it, the more you appreciate what in fact you are seeing. For us, it has whetted our appetite and truly raises our respect for all of mankind that has passed this earth before us.

Today we took a little side trip into the country and rolled down a steep loose trail to explore a truly rural church. The small chapel is located literally out in the middle of nowhere and the door was held shut with a shoelace. We don’t know its age or its history but it seems to be used by about four or five people as there were plenty of candles and seating for less than a Camper van. It had lovely icons of different saints hidden under a dust cover on an easel and the alter was assembled with flat stones with a roman pillar ‘capital’ as its base. An old brass church bell the size of a football hung outside and Laurel cautioned me not to ring it as I was so tempted. Saturday evening at 5 PM and not a soul within miles, but who knows??? Oh ya, God.

Tomorrow is church once more and as we cycle between our original Anglican service in a medieval sanctuary, and the evangelistic service at a tourist Hotel, we are torn as both have great folks and offer lovely worship – it just isn’t Comox United Church! So we press on gaining spiritual strength and forming warm friendships as we go.

Finally, we hope that our home phone might be connected in the next week so that we may once again get online more often.

Love Dale and Laurel

18 Oct 2007 St Luke's Day in Kouklia

We had a great day yesterday without leaving the village as we finally visited our Museum and the Sanctuary grounds of Aphrodite. The history was overwhelming and really helped us to appreciate what we have at our doorstep. It is so steeped in events that the Roman period seems relatively recent and of more common interest than the other periods after and more to the point prior to .... I wish we could share the experience better with this blog but you will just have to see for yourself, someday as it is so neat to be there live. Laurel said she felt an sense of calm and wonderful feeling each time she stepped onto the grounds. We went in twice that day. That evening the village was abuzz with celebrations on the eve of St. Luke. There were numerous street vendors and music, food and of course the Taverns were doing a great business. The population of 700 grew to about 2000, but that is nothing considering over 20 centuries ago the population was more than 100,000.Some say they were counting the goats and chickens back then so who really knows. Good fun all round.

We are still waiting for the internet at home so this will be short. TTYS



Love Dale and Laurel

October 16, 2007

Last week was a prime example of Cypriot time. On Monday, we stayed home as the telephone people were coming. The same happened on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Today, one week later, they came. Unfortunately, even with everything in place we have been told to call back in a week to check on the progress. I am hoping to have a phone and internet by the end of the year!
Meanwhile, at least while were waiting at home, the air conditioning guys came and moved the unit in the spare room to the outside wall, since the drain was plugged on the inside wall. Now the painter has to come and repair the old wall, and paint (they say sometime this week). Also, while we were waiting on Cytaphone, the landscapers came and put in the plants around the pool. Hopefully pictures will accompany this. Oh yes, and the Jacuzzi (cold only) has a bit of a decorative jug and stonework done, and the light fixtures are now up in the house. (We were then in the dark for the night as the electrician finished at suppertime, and we didn’t have any light-bulbs!)
The good news is – we are in a lovely place, the sun is shining, and the temperature is 27C with a lovely sea breeze. The pool is only 22C, so it is getting harder daily to convince ourselves that it is worth going in, but so far so good.
Saturday we decided to get in on some local culture, and visited a few of the local art studios. Every October they set up a tour of various studios all over the island. I hope to visit a couple more next week-end – the problem is finding them. They do give directions, but sometimes it is difficult to find which Kiosk (convenience store) to turn at, or how accurate 500 meters is. All in all though, very worthwhile and good for finding other points of interest later on.
Sunday was interesting, as we went to the Pafos Christian Fellowship Church. It was a very free style, unstructured service, similar to the Church we attended in Cairo. We met several very lovely people, and enjoyed a very long lunch out with them. They all asked if we were coming back next week, so it seems like we will. Now it would be possible to attend both the Anglican Church at 0830am and the Christian Fellowship church at 1030, but I think we will have to make a decision between the very traditional and the very evangelical. They are both very unique and lovely, but I don’t think we are quite up to two services every week. As it was, we went to a non-denominational service at 6pm at the home of the Calvary Church Pastor which is also their meeting place. We are certainly getting around.
Today we went to the Municipal Office in Koukia to try and find out our address – nobody knows. We are hoping that they invent one by tomorrow, as we have given out the wrong address several times already. Of course, we can’t pay our water or electric until we have an address, so perhaps if we have problems our contractor might step in as he is presently responsible for these bills.
Dale is now gone to Limossol (Lemesos) to visit his company’s central office, while I am heading out to my second Greek lesson. I can now read Greek; I just don’t know what the words mean! Hopefully it will all come together at some point.

Today is Tuesday, and Neokleus from the Village office came by and gave us an address.

It will be interesting to see if it works. We are -

6 Paleopaphos Gardens

Apostolou Luka Avenue

Kouklia 8500 Cyprus

Love,

Laurel

Oct 6 2007 Trip to Trodoos Mountains

Has it really been that long? After Berlin, I got to go to Athens for 3 hours on my way back to Cyprus. Didn’t see anything other than the view from the airplane! The rest of the week has been catching up on shopping and cleaning. Our Contractor sent over more workmen, so other things are getting done as well. The outside shower has been retiled, and the phone/internet is one step closer, but we are still on Cypriot time. I know you will have complete sympathy for me as the nights have been cooling off and it is so much colder to go in the pool. It is still a pleasant 28C during the day, but you have to wait until at least 2 or 3 pm to go for a swim. Hard to believe for early October.

Dale got home yesterday, so after getting him going on his job jar (yes, he still has one here), we went into Pafos and splurged on a Cappuccino machine. What a treat, and by the time company arrives, we should be all practiced up and hopefully know what we are doing. Today we decided to play tourists. We drove up into the Troodos Mountains to have a look around, and see if we could find the ski hill. After a wonderful lunch of fresh trout and pork chops, we found a green corrugated tin conglomeration that said Cyprus Ski Hill and Cafeteria, Mt. Olympus. We searched diligently until we found a very short hill with a towrope or poma lift and thought we were done. Upon further investigation – quite a drive down a very rough rocky road – we came upon another towrope or poma lift. We couldn’t believe that this was all they had to offer, but as there was no sign of anything else, we got in the car and kept driving. What a surprise to find a stone building with what looks like chair lift towers, another couple of miles down the road. They must be connected, but we’ll have to wait until ski season to see a map or something, and to see just how much vertical they have. The rest of the drive was a challenge too. The road kept changing from two lane – one each direction – to one very narrow lane, that had gravel shoulders on the corners in case someone decided to come from the other direction at the same time. The photo of our car going through a rock cropping was particularly beautiful and intriguing. The goats at returning from the mountains caught our eye as did the bougainvillea flowers That and no guardrails on some tricky bends, kept us very alert and cautious. The scenery was gorgeous and very wild and diverse, so we made a lot of stops along the way - including a local winery on the way home (Nelion Wines in Pretori). They had over a dozen different wines to taste, so it was a good thing it was close to Kouklia.

Tomorrow we are hoping to have Lefteris and Sharon over for a visit after Church. The weather should be pretty much the same – we did get a thunder and lightening show yesterday, but all was clear today. We will try and do a bit more sightseeing later this week when we find out when the Air Conditioner guys and the carpenter are coming.

Bye for now.
Love,
Laurel

2 Oct Berlin Zoo

Hi Everyone. Since I am staying at the Zoo am Berlin Hotel, I thought I should go see Germany's oldest Zoo. It was a most pleasant way to spend the day. The photos as usual don't do it justice, but this has to be the finest zoo I have ever visited. I leave Berlin on Thursday and hope to be home with Laurel later that evening. Hopefully internet will be in our home soon. Take care. Dale

1 Oct 2007 Berlin German AirForce Museum

Hi Everyone, Dale’s turn to write. So you get lots of pictures for my pilot friends. We had a great week in Berlin and when Laurel left me for her Greek lessons back in Cyprus, I wiped a tear, then ran off to the LuftwaffenMuseum to see – more airplanes! When your done come back and hit this link.. http://www.b-domke.de/AviationImages/Luftwaffenmuseum.html Lots of cool photos. As the photos show, they have a great collection. Of interest was one room dedicated to George AFB in the States. On the ceiling were stapled up ceiling panels with logos of units. One that caught my eye was 42 Radar Sqn in Cold Lake, next was 410 and 441 Sqn with signed autographs of some of our Canadian Fighter pilot colleagues. What a strange feeling seeing them up there in a hangar in a small village in Eastern Germany. I will let the photos do the rest. But I would encourage you to double click the last photo. It is of a display of a poster of the Reichstag infront of some actual aircraft wreckage. It was disturbing to realise that it is an actual photo of the same parliament building with the glass bubble we just visited. The field in view is now brilliant green with lovely landscaping and prepared for the Berlin Marathon celebrations. Then.... It really showed me how fragile our securtity is given man's capacity for destruction. I leave for Cairo on Thursday and home by the weekend. Laurel’s got a job jar that I have been meaning to get to…. Honest….