Maggi and Kiki and I have booked an excursion, a freebie put on by the Larnaca regional tourist bureau, taking us, we're told, to the villages of Lefkara and Tochni. We're not alone. The young Lithuanian men and some Russian women from our hotel go, and there are other pick up stops until the big touring coach is full - the last joiners a large contingent of Poles from the Flamingo hotel along Makenzy Beach.
Eleni, the guide, Maggi remembers from years back. She's quite good - informative, if a bit relentless, and not too badly distorting on the issue of Cypriot history. In Lefkara we're greeted outside the town hall with a happily brief speech and plastic glasses of wine, billed ominously as medium sweet but actually a bit like Dubonnet, slightly lemony and rather nice in an aperitif sort of way. It's accompanied by almonds - the freshest I've ever tasted, sweet and crunchy. Eleni takes us on a walk through the steep little streets and lanes, cobbled and so narrow that in places a little bridge, mini version of Venice's bridge of sighs, links two houses across a lane. Many of the houses have been beautifully restored but the weather is chilly enough that the women who make the lace for which the village is famed are mostly indoors and not working in their doorways. Maggi, Kiki and I have coffee a corner café with an attractive but relatively ineffectual fireplace, and Kiki produces from her handbag a bag of lovely biscuits her sister has baked.
Then off by coach to a restaurant where we see a demonstration of Cypriot breadmaking. Quite interesting: there's a sourdough style starter and a mixing bowl that is actually a rectangular trough, about two feet long, and the woman adds alternately warm water and flour. Traditionally, the guide says, mothers gave the starter to their daughters at marriage. Then the five loaves are put in the round indentations in a long board and left to rise before being baked on a pizza style paddle in a beehive-shaped outdoor oven. There's time for lunch, and M, K and a have moussaka, salad and a glass of red wine, and I tease Kiki about her "magic" handbag, from which she produces little sesame and nut confections at the end of our meal. Then return trip. My seatmate, Danuka, is from Krakow, here on a two week holiday with her husband.
Treats not over for the day, as we join M in her flat for g&t and meze - lovely little snacks including her excellent tzatziki and a very nice pickled herring.
Eleni, the guide, Maggi remembers from years back. She's quite good - informative, if a bit relentless, and not too badly distorting on the issue of Cypriot history. In Lefkara we're greeted outside the town hall with a happily brief speech and plastic glasses of wine, billed ominously as medium sweet but actually a bit like Dubonnet, slightly lemony and rather nice in an aperitif sort of way. It's accompanied by almonds - the freshest I've ever tasted, sweet and crunchy. Eleni takes us on a walk through the steep little streets and lanes, cobbled and so narrow that in places a little bridge, mini version of Venice's bridge of sighs, links two houses across a lane. Many of the houses have been beautifully restored but the weather is chilly enough that the women who make the lace for which the village is famed are mostly indoors and not working in their doorways. Maggi, Kiki and I have coffee a corner café with an attractive but relatively ineffectual fireplace, and Kiki produces from her handbag a bag of lovely biscuits her sister has baked.
Then off by coach to a restaurant where we see a demonstration of Cypriot breadmaking. Quite interesting: there's a sourdough style starter and a mixing bowl that is actually a rectangular trough, about two feet long, and the woman adds alternately warm water and flour. Traditionally, the guide says, mothers gave the starter to their daughters at marriage. Then the five loaves are put in the round indentations in a long board and left to rise before being baked on a pizza style paddle in a beehive-shaped outdoor oven. There's time for lunch, and M, K and a have moussaka, salad and a glass of red wine, and I tease Kiki about her "magic" handbag, from which she produces little sesame and nut confections at the end of our meal. Then return trip. My seatmate, Danuka, is from Krakow, here on a two week holiday with her husband.
Treats not over for the day, as we join M in her flat for g&t and meze - lovely little snacks including her excellent tzatziki and a very nice pickled herring.
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