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Published: July 30th 2017
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Coming into Buffavento villageNo doggie friend for Kilroy on his walks as Buddy dog has gone to stay with Gary's friends whilst Gary is off for a short break. Never mind he will have to put up with us. As we have nothing planned today it was a longer walk this morning, taking a big circular route from our place, across the top of the ravine near the goat farm and then a wander down the road to nowhere until it finally entered the outskirts of Catalkoy. Then back down the ravine via a good track before heading uphill and back home. About 1hr 40mins wander. First thing when we reached home was a Kilroy shower, which he really does enjoy. Hose him down for a few minutes to cool off then it was shampoo time and a bit of a scrub, plenty of water to wash off the soap suds followed by a 5 minute shake around to dry off. We also took the opportunity to give our walking boots a good wash out as well as they were very dusty. Then it was time for humans to get cleaned up, spot of breakfast and then not a
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Villa Buffavento village lot. Retired indoors at 11am with aircon on for reading and tv as the temperature today is expected to rise to around 37C and as we enter the weekend the heatwave is returning and we will top 40C again.
A lovely lazy day just reading, bit of tv, spot of lunch moving occasionally from the lounge to the patio garden area or front balcony depending on which part was in the shade. Late afternoon John took Kilroy for a short stroll before we headed off for the quiz night. No Gary this week, an advantage some may say. We did well,pipped at the post by 1 point so a good team effort.Quizzed out we headed home for supper, no preparation needed as we had plenty of salad and cold chicken left over from last night. Then round the block with the hound and off to bed with a good book. Exhausting day!
Thursday 27th July 2017 Todays walking route was on the roads again, downhill around our local area. It's nice to check out how the builds are progressing on some of the villas....some of the machinery being used is really ancient. As we come back into
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Our street Buffavento village you notice how tidy the place is and how many of the gardens are well looked after. Once back home we decided that we would take the jeep and go for a drive in the hills west side and drop down to the coast and travel along as far as we could go to the western tip of the TRNC to Sadrazamkoy. Breakfasted, loaded up with some water and off we set. Firstly it was via Girne and the main road to Lefkosa turning off and heading towards St Hilarion castle. This is a great start to the drive as the road winds ever upwards with some fantastic views over Girne and both the north coast and the central plain across to the Troodos mountains. As we have visited the castle many times we continued onwards picking up the mountain road heading west. Plenty of opportunities for picture taking and also stopping off at places of interest as the road winds its way along allowing great views of the coast and central plain. One nice spot is the famous tank site........it was in this place in 1974 that two turkish tanks travelling up the road were attacked. The
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Buffavento pool at 7:20am. The pool is 20mtrs from our little place! lead tank was partially disabled and blocked the narrow mountain road, so the rear tank commander used his tank and pushed it off the road and then continued to provide cover whilst the crew of the first tank made good their escape. The tank has remained in this spot ever since as a memorial to the Turkish forces and the peace operation. In 2014 there was a poignant gathering as the soldiers manning the tanks returned to the island to remember what happened all those 40years ago. There is also some billboards giving a little bit of background and history to how the events of 1974 came about. Just around the corner from this site we bumped into the UNMAS - United Nations Mine Action Survey team who were parked up discussing mined areas and what had/had not been cleared - pretty sure our road was safe. It was onwards as the road headed downhill again back to the coast joining the main road that heads from Girne to Camlibel at Karsiyaka. We soon turned off the main road and followed amother single track road towards Kayalar and Sadrazamkoy. A great drive, very few vehicles and some lovely unspoilt beaches
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St Hilarion Castle along the way. We called in at Horseshoe Bay taverna for a Turkish coffee and a rest. Nice setting but could have done with a bit of a tidy around.......mind you when we came to pay for the coffees the owner said "You are Inglize......so you don't have to pay"! Bargain. Travelled ever onwards not seeing another car along the road - if you live this far out you wouldn't want to have forgotten any essential shopping items! Fantastically isolated. Having gone virtually to the western tip of the north coast we came to a stop at a small ruined house next to a weather station. This was it, as far as we could travel. Time to do a u turn and meander back homewards but as it was lunchtime we stopped off at Sandourka Ranch.....what a find this proved to be. Travelling down a winding track to a gloriously unspoilt little beach, a few sun beds, taverna and crystal clear sea. The place is owned and run by Greek maronites who live in a village not far away here in the North.....you can tell because they speak Greek fluently and there vehicles are all registered in the south plus
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Views from the mountains to the central plain the menu is priced in euros. Oh and they only sell Keo beer and not Efes. Sarah had the halloumi, chips, pitta and salad and John the burger, chips and salad. All washed down with a cold Keo. It was a real time warp of a place - it really felt like the Cyprus of 40yrs ago. We will be returning here as it's such a lovely spot, taverna on the beach, nice cool breeze and no tourist tat. Lunch finished we headed off driving for another hour. On the way home we called into Supreme for essentials plus we decided to have the special meal of the day for supper tonight as it saves cooking, this time it was rice with a bean, pea, potato and carrot veggie option. Back home around 3pm to a doggie welcome, cold drinks and then we took Kilroy for a quick walk before settling down to a couple of hours just chilling.
Picked up a message from the animal rescue centre, Kilroys blood test results had come back - all clear - great stuff. He is now able to travel to the UK anytime after the 11th October, which works perfectly for
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Central plain down below us as we travel home mid Nov. Time to move onto the next stage which is sorting out his travel crate, making sure flights are booked and he has had injections, worming and tick/flea treatment. Good news for the hound, we did tell him but he was busy checking the inside of his eyelids so not sure if it registered. Once things had cooled at around 7pm, Sarah took Kilroy on his evening promenade. Home for a shower before settling ourselves down on the garden patio with a glass of wine, cold beer and some nibbles. There was a nice cool breeze blowing to make things more comfortable and hound was in his element laid down by the back gate. After our filling lunch we decided to share the meal of the day supper from Supreme accompanied by some bread and a little salad. All in all a lovely day.
Friday 28th July 2017 Nice walk this morning as there is a pleasant breeze blowing so keeping the temperature down. Once we were back home a little bit of gardening and also work to train the bougainvillea to grow in the direction we want. Following a quick cuppa
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High in the hills looking to Girne and toast it was Friday clean up time which was all done and dusted by 10:30am. Quick check of the feeezer, another BBQ planned for this evening, so selected BBQ marinated chicken and also lamb shish, that should do us nicely. Retired to the patio in the shade, breeze still blowing and coffee to hand whilst the floor indoors dried after Sarah had mopped thro. All jobs done it was a quiet day for us so pool time and armed with sun screen, shades, books and drinks to hand we strolled the short distance and grabbed ourselves a spot. No one else around so again the whole pool to ourseleves - the breeze today is making all the difference taking away the humidity which makes things much more comfortable. After a good few hours of enjoying our private pool, we came home for a shower and lunch sat on the balcony. Late afternoon and we noticed a south side hire car arrive and park up at the very end property - in all our time coming out here we had never seen anyone in the place. Out jumped mum, dad and three little ones. They ran up the stairs and
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Tank memorial site in the mountains after a bit of fiddling with the keys in they went - we did wonder what it would be like inside as from experience if you don't use things they go wrong! Plus you do need to keep on top of the maintenance as again the sun, heat and even the winter rains take there toll. Sure enough about 30mins later we got a shout for help......appears water not working. Did a few checks and managed to turn water on, tank was filling, in fact it overfilled as the ballcock was broken - new ballcock required. Next it was checking of the pump which pumps water from the main storage tank to the roof tank - sadly it looks like the bearings have seized. Inside was a bit of a mess as despite it being closed up, the dust managed to creep in. Anyway we did what we could to help and gave them a couple of plumbers numbers and offered tea, sympathy and shower facilities. Dad was despatched to the pool with the youngsters whilst mum started to dig the place out - starting upstairs so as they could have somewhere to retreat to once they were finished at
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Historical Information the pool. Feel sorry for them as it turns out the place is owned by the ladies mum who has been unwell and could not come out for many years. Anyway a plumber will be out tomorrow to sort water and once that's ok I am sure the cleaning will easily be finished and in a day or so things will be fine. We will offer help if they need it, but they seem ok so far. They are here for another 2 weeks so we are confident that this will be quickly forgotten once the pool, beach, food and weather share there influence on them.
Call from Orhan - our painter/decorator/handyman, to say the kitchen units have nearly been built. He wanted to check on the worktop we had ordered because the size we want is just slightly to long, meaning we would need the worktop to come in two pieces. He did say he had managed to source another worktop, almost the same style and colour which would come as one piece - did we want to take a look or stay with what we had chosen. In the end we decided to trust Orhans judgement and
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Historical Information rather than rush off to take a look we just told him to go ahead and order the one piece. Orhan will give us a call next week to give us a start date - will be very soon. We are having new kitchen cupboard fronts installed plus additional cupboard and shelving, new worktop and tiles. Then the inside of our little place will be repainted. We wanted to get everything done in one hit and Orhan reckons about 4 days in all to complete. Think we will be mainly surviving off Supreme supermarkets meals of the day. John wandered off for 40mins with Kilroy whilst Sarah emptied the ironing basket, then home to prepare for tonight's supper. Decided to give the quiz a miss tonight, so as we could enjoy a long leisurely evening listening to R2 with a few drinks and a leisurely BBQ. Tonight we have lamb shish, BBQ chicken, salad, tashi sauce and pittas. Sarah was in charge of sundowners, a chilled red wine for her and she made a great Brandy Sour for John - been well taught!
Saturday 29th July 2017 Roadwork for our morning walk with Kilroy, down the hill towards
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Looking down on the reservoir which is being supplied water via the pipeline from Turkey. the Malpas hotel and then a slow wander back up. Tea once we were home and then off to do a supermarket shop. Changed money with the rate today being £1 = 4.60TL. First stop was bakery for a fresh olive and helim loaf for tonight's supper, then supermarket shop, veg and fruit shack and back to Buffavento village. Back home in time for breakfast more tea and a chill. Plumber has turned up to help the lady a few doors down from us sort her water out. My initial findings were correct. Pump had failed. The plumber was Orhan and he was the man who rescued us three times in a week when we first bought our place 5 years ago. We also had a broken pump, leaking pipes etc.......he is very good and will come out anytime. Once he had finished the repairs in our neighbours place he came across for a quick chat and a catch up. The rest of the morning was spent doing very little, a bit of reading interspersed with cups of tea. Lunchtime and John strolled to the pool to check on the lights, they were not working last night for some reason.
Turns out the fuse is tripping out when the timer turns the lights on........a quick check and a transformer has burnt out. Call to pool man who will be coming out to fix. Then it was across to Garys place to check on the dogs. Buddy and Narla were deposited this morning by Bruce who was on dog watch for Gary whilst he was on his hols. However; Bruce had a prior engagement today so we said we would keep a watch out for them and also feed etc if Bruce was happy to drop them both off at Garys house. Dogs were snoozing the day away. After this excitement it was time to relax with a film to while away the afternoon - watched The Pianist, thought it very good. Kilroys evening walk done, John fed the dogs and then we retired to the front balcony to resume our scrabble championship games. John leading up to the halfway point then Sarah comes back with a storming second half and races away with a win. Think it's now a clear 5-3 lead for Sarah in the series.
Supper tonight was macaroni cheese, with fresh olive and cheese loaf and
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Loving the green colour of this old Hillman some salad all followed by some nice chilled water melon. Nice day today and although it's hot at around 37C, the breeze has kept the humidity down so feels much more bearable. Supper done we listened to some tunes whilst doing a bit of star gazing. Then the exertions of the day caught up so off to bed!
Sunday 30th July 2017 Awake and up a little earlier this morning to find our young neighbours and friends sat on their balcony and chatting - reckon they must have been out all night. Oh to be young! After the usual tea to get us going we set off for our stroll in the hills. Plenty of goats around as their bells on the neck collars were ringing well. It certainly got Kilroys nose in the air, trouble is they are far to clever and just as he thought he was about to spot them they would disappear behind another set of bushes. Back home by 7:20am, bit of sweeping up outside, water the garden and then more tea. All so very quiet around the village this morning not a sound for over two hours, just Kilroy snoozing. Sometime after
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Horseshoe Bay near Kayalar we went to bed last night Ahmet and Tahiri arrived as there car is parked up outside their place, they were the first ones about just before 10am. Ahmet retrieved a rickety home made old wooden ladder from the corner of the garden and proceeded to scale up onto his roof, not sure someone of his age should be doing this so John kept a careful watch on what was happening. No need to worry he scaled the ladder like a teenager! It will be the usual Sunday routine with breakfast followed by Sarah heading off to church and John can catch up on some admin whilst Kilroy chooses a film to watch. Sarah home lunchtime - light snack and then what to do for the rest of the day. Pool, beach, go for a drive or just chill reading a good book, decisions, decisions. In the end we decided chill with a book.
Around 5pm we sat outside on the balcony enjoying yet another cup of tea. Ahmet was in conversation with the new people who had arrived a couple of days ago. He was explaining to them that they had a leak in there top tank which
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Busy road near Sadrazamkoy he discovered after climbing onto the roof this morning. Small hole allowing water to escape.......not good news. He then called us over to help with the explanation and then to help further he rang a man who could supply a new tank. After a bit of talking and exchanging of phone numbers it looks like there will be another tradesman arriving tomorrow to investigate and likely replace the roof tank. Now that this problem had been sorted Ahmet asked us all to sit, have a coffee and a chat. Spent about half an hour catching up on family etc before it was time for Kilroys evening stroll around the block. Back home for a shower and changed and Sarah's choice of venue for a meal out. This time it was the Hurma Restaurant about five minutes drive away eastwards next to the Acapulco hotel. We arrived to a very busy car park and on walking in noticed it was full of local people, which is a good sign. Sarah ordered the lamb kleftico and John the full kebab, all accompanied by a huge number of cold and hot mezes. First time visit to this restaurant and it's another to add
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End of the road to the list, really enjoyed the food. Managed even to take home a doggie bag for Kilroy. Back home and fed the hound, quick stroll around the block and then off to bed.
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