Travel Review Northern Cyprus Day 3: Golden Beach, Monastery of St. Andreas and more!

Hello dear blog readers,

here is my next travel review of my round trip through the north part of the island Cyprus!

The morning of the third day of my travel trip started with the great and very rich breakfast buffet of Kaya Artemis Hotel Resort again. And again we were lucky enough to enjoy a very sunny day, after it rained a lot in the days before our arrival and even some hotels should even have been flooded.

Our tour guide Nurkan Tolunay has told us that it has been raining more in Cyprus this December than normally in a whole year. We didn´t notice much of it on our trip, even though there were a few rain showers on some days, but right after it the sun came out again. Then it got warm and there was up to 20 degrees with the sun and we had great T-shirt weather!

After breakfast we went to the excursion destinations of the day.

At first, we enjoyed a wonderful panoramic ride in the direction of Karpaz, made a little stop in between and drove on to the Golden Beach. The Golden Beach is considered the most beautiful beach in Northern Cyprus and is one of many beautiful coastal strips of the pristine part of Northern Cyprus, the Karpaz peninsula.

The "Caretta Caretta" sea turtles also lay their eggs at this beautiful beach and there is the only breeding facility in Northern Cyprus for this protected animals.

Then we went on to the fascinating monastery of St. Andreas, which was dedicated to the Apostle Andreas and is located directly at the sea.

The monastery is considered one of the most important pilgrimage sites of the Cypriot Orthodox Church and was known internationally as the Lourdes of Cyprus. In the 12th century, there was a fortified monastery (time unknown), as Richard the Lionheart accepted here the surrender of Isaac Komnenos, the last Byzantine ruler of Cyprus, who had made himself independent in 1185. From this first monastery, no building fabric is preserved.

The present church and convent buildings were rebuilt from 1865 to 1867. After visiting the church from the outside and waiting a short time for the pastor to open the church, we also got an impression of the inside.

Then we had the opportunity to freely explore the monastery and there is also a natural water source with "holy water", which of course had to taste.

In front of the monastery and in the area you could see many wild donkeys, which were brought to the island by settlers in the past. At some point, they were released and have established an independent wild population there until today. The donkeys also deliberately put themselves in front of cars and buses to make one on customs officials. xD

Then we went to a small fishing village called "Dipkarpaz", where we were able to visit an old Orthodox church, a mosque and a beautifully designed school.

The next stop was at a nice spot by the sea, where you could eat fresh Mediterranean Sea fish in a great fish restaurant, or make yourself comfortable in the sun by the sea, where there was also a small nice restaurant.

The last spot of the day was the small ecological village "Büyükkonuk", where the church of Agios Afksentios is located, which was restored by a cult project of the EU. In this village, everything is made from organic farming and there are no plastic bags in the supermarket, for example. On a small market you could taste and buy various organic products. We also tasted the home-made wines, Rakis and the traditional Cypriot brandy "Zivania", which has an alcohol content of 45%. I have bought a delicious mountain honey for home.

Then in the afternoon we drove back to the hotel relatively early, so that everyone who would like to enjoy the great sunny day on the beach and the benefits of the Kaya Artemis hotel.

I took the opportunity to go to the sea on the beach to swim a little bit and then I checked out the SPA area of the hotel, where was a sauna and a steam room in addition to an indoor pool.

Later it was time to pack up, because the next day we went to Kyrenia, where we got a new hotel as accommodation. In the evening you could enjoy the delicious dinner of the Kaya Artemis Hotel, with a huge selection of different dishes and then, if you are interested, free drinks at the bar.

This day was full of nice impressions again and it was a lot of fun.
Stay tuned for the next travel review and greetings!

Jonas - @future24

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PS: This article was published with the Esteem Surfer Software by @good-karma and the @esteemapp team.