Cyprus and all Afloat!
We had a fantastic family holiday this year and wanted to make it extra special, as we wondered if this might be it might be the last such holiday where our eldest came with us for the full time, being as next year he will be 18 and probably off with his first friends.
So, we made it a little longer than usual, almost three and a half weeks, and went out to Cyprus to see my parents, who retired there around 12 years ago. Therefore, a real family holiday, children, parents and grand parents!
We spent lots of time on the various wonderful beaches, such as Curium, which has some large waves to play through, good thing my children are more at home in the water than out of it.
Hubby is actually disappearing under the wave as he takes the picture!
And on some more gentle water beaches, for snorkeling and swimming, such as Makronissos, with its beautiful white sand and crystal clear water!
My 12 year old son also found time to qualify as a Padi Junior Diver! So now joins his father and elder brother as an officially qualified diver, able to go to 12 meters in depth; it'll be a little longer until he is old enough to take further Diving qualifications like his brother, or to join his Dad in the depth's of 35 meter's plus.
Here he is with his instructor going through some of his underwater examinations.
And here are some of the new friends he made!
Whilst my Son and Hubby were Diving, my eldest son, little girl and I went sight seeing. This is the beautiful Tekke Mosque in Larnaca, picture taken from across the salt lake, which miraculously still had water in it! It is usually bone dry in August!
Ahoy!
During our Holiday, we had an extra special treat, we took a short cruise from Cyprus around some of the Greek Islands, and landed at Santorini and Kastellorizo two beautiful and unique islands!
This is the ship we went on, moored in the harbour at Kastellorizo!
Mum and Dad came with us and it is something we will all remember, but especially the children, we had a superb time and saw some amazing sights.
Santorini is an active volcano, with the centre of the volcano building up again in the natural harbour created when the it last blew its top.
The houses and shops are built on the rim of the volcano and the ships are moored within crater itself, the passengers are ferried in little tenders to the main land.
To get to the top of the rim where the shops and houses are located is in one of two ways, either on donkey or mule up the zig zag path,
or on a cable car, I'm afraid I felt quite sorry for the animals and there was no way I was going to punish them further with my weight.
And the children really enjoyed the ride, even if there was a little screaming here and there!
My little gift from Santorini was two lumps of lava! My Dad thought I was mad and that I should have 'pushed the boat out', but at 600 meters in depth, there was no way I would have been able to do that! LOL!
The second island hop was the picturesque Kastellorizo!
This little island is only 5 square miles, and yet again set within very deep water, the ship actually harboured right beside the little bistro's and houses!
After disembarking, we swam from the bar you can see above, the hexagonal yellow one!Later we took a stroll around the little harbour town, with some of the narrowest streets you can imagine, just barely donkey width apart! Yes my little girl is posing between two houses, and the wall does indeed arch out like that, stooping donkey path me thinks!
And then went on a little boat to a blue grotto cave, the entrance was so low, we had to sit in the base of the little rowing boat, but once inside the colours of the cave were breath taking and the size within like a cathedral!
Short Blue Cave Video!
