A beautiful day...

We woke this morning to glorious sunshine and sounds reminiscent of the wild west as we were surrounded by horses in the field next door, two which seemed to have been staked out there and two which had seemingly cut loose and come to visit!!!  None of these appeared to be Big Foot or Little Foot so we think these must be something to do with Andreas from across the way plus they look reasonably healthy to the untrained eye and he does seem to take better care of his animals than some.

The cats were quite confused by the unfamiliar noises coming from nearby - Charlie was in full-on growl mode but eventually they all got used to the horses and settled down - Boris found himself a nice sunny spot on the table by the steamer chairs and relaxed in the beautifully warm sunshine.  We think the warmer weather is affecting their appetite, that or the fact that they are supplementing their diets with the odd lizard or two as they don't seem to be eating anything like as much as they have been which is good news for Charlie's hips!!

Tomorrow is Mothering Sunday and we are going out to lunch at the Magic Garden with Mum and Dad.  I have a card for Mum from Sheila and I had made a card for Mum and needed to wrap the little gift I had got for her - difficult to find something for the woman with everything but I know she likes a bit of costume jewelry and so that is what I had got her.  We sent John's mum flowers which we know had already arrived safe and sound and she was pleased with them - thank you Bunches you never let us down.


It was such a wonderful day that we decided to take a stroll around the village.  We had a cable to drop off for Lola as she is currently unable to charge her Ipod and it is causing her serious grief!!  It was Greek Independence Day today which is a Bank Holiday on the island so most of the village seemed to have gone down to Polis to watch the parade.  Bassam and the children were there so we didn't get to sample a cup of Lebanese coffee with him.

En route we spotted one of the old houses which looks to be being done up - outside were some fabulous chairs - they looked like original 1960s - great shape but horrible upholstery - would have like to have thought they were being got rid of but they were well and truly tied together - with some different material they would have looked fabulous in the conservatory and they were low so like our 'birthing' chair comfortable to sit in.

Our walk took us past the Community Office where we managed to catch Marianna to ask her how the demonstration had got on yesterday in Nicosia.  We couldn't make it having been only given a few hours' notice but the demonstration was to point out that the villages in this corner of the island feel disadvantaged by decisions made in Nicosia - we are apparently forgot in the thought making processes and promised improvements have never materialised.  She said that there was a good turn out but whether it has any impact or not only time will tell.

We were then caught nosing over the garden of the bungalow next to the new community office because we thought it was still unoccupied and were surprised to be greeted by an English woman who must have thought us rather strange!  As it turns out we bumped into her again later on - she and her husband have rented the bungalow for a year as they plan to retire to Cyprus - they have a son living with them and a mother who may or may not be living there too - we didn't find out - anyway so far they love the village and said that people have been exceptionally kind to them helping them settle in.

We wandered down around the village stopping and taking photographs and walking up some of the little side streets that we haven't walked up before to see what we might find and to check out gardens to see what plants are surviving.  We came across another horse - this was most definitely a stallion and we decided to give it a wide berth as it was a bit snorty and agitated.  Next to it were several interesting but dilapidated buildings which looked to have been turned into its stable.

The village is looking lovely and relatively clean and tidy as we were looking at our next route for the clean up.  Our village cleaner clearly does a good job with the village centre but he is just one guy on his own after all so he cannot

We had a good old wander round - there were very few people about - not that there is ever that many but it is a holiday weekend so we had expected to see one or two more people but if they had come to the village they were now down in Paphos or Polis watching the parades.  Apart from the new English lady we saw no-one else to speak to until we stopped for coffee at the Akamas Coffee shop.

One of the houses that we had not seen before provided some inspiration for a project for John when he has absolutely nothing better to do - this house had a spiral natural stone wall which hid the outside shower - what a fabulous idea.  Currently we have a nice wooden hinged surround but that will need to be replaced in due course and when it does a natural stone construction will be fab.

We stopped for coffee with Despina in the coffee shop and have to thank Demitri for paying for it for us.  We watched the world go by and bumped into the people living in the bungalow again and made our apologies for peering over their wall - they were absolutely fine about it.  We hope they settle in ok and like the village - it seems to be going well so far for them which is good.

I was going shopping this afternoon whilst John and Rob went to ENAD's final game of the season.  By this time of the week it is like Mother Hubbard's cupboard so John was more than a little bit worried that he would not have anything to eat but I managed to rustle up some cheese on toast and a salad which he thoroughly enjoyed!!

We picked up Rabia and Rob and Diana and went down to Polis so the boys could watch the football which was apparently being televised and there was a mega noisy crowd assembling - if ENAD didn't win today they were going to be relegated.

Diana and I went off with the cameras and my little tripod for Di to try out - it was glorious and on Limni Pier there was some sort of professional photoshoot going on which we photographed from a distance!!

I did my shopping and then we went and picked up the boys.  Apparently ENAD had suffered a draw so were going to be going down - don't know whether John will be bothering with a season ticket next year!