An "Amuse-Bouche" If You Will
Saturday/Sunday November 12th and 13th, 2022
The cult has arrived! The Spandex Squad and Lycra Lackies are starting to fill the resort. A place that yesterday was dead and eerily quiet is now starting to show signs of life with more and more people starting to trickle in. At breakfast there are a good number of people and many I can identify as "my people". We must have a smell or something... either way we are all apparently easily identifiable, even without branding, to each other and outsiders lol.
Oh and I finally slept! YAY!!
Check-in for the event was at 10am so we had breakfast and waited to check-in. Got my passes and shirt and then we headed off to explore. Because I skipped RPM and Sprint (no thanks), my first class wasn't until 3:45pm which means we had a good 4+ hours to go exploring. So we headed back to the beachfront and took a right down the boardwalk, all the way to the end. What a gorgeous walk! The Sun was shining, it was hot but dry with a nice breeze off the sea. The views are tremendous the entire way. Mostly resorts but also municipal beaches interspersed.
At the end of the boardwalk we started noticing more and more people and eventually emerged onto a main pedestrian "tourist" area. Full of souvenir shops, restaurants, cafes and stores. And LOTS OF PEOPLE. No idea where everyone was the night before...but clearly this is where all the people go. The end of the path leads to the harbour front where you can take a variety of boat/cruise rides and to the ancient castle. From there a path winds all the way around the archeological site, following the sea. It feels endless!
So we kept walking and walking and just enjoying the scenery and the weather, finally reaching the end of the path and entering the city proper. The next stop was the archealogical site itself and going inside it. This was much larger than expected. A fair number of excavations within it, different "houses" and locations...but the most spectacular thing were the mosaics! Massive stone mosaics with intricate detail and designs of all kinds. Some simply geometrical, some depicting a story or a person. All flooring dating back anywhere from ancient times to about 3-5th century CE (previously known as AD). It's remarkable how well preserved some are and how much work would have gone into creating these.
Other sites within included various ruins of ancient houses for kings and gods, the lighthouse, remains of a medieval castle and an ancient odeon and agora (town court). What's really interesting is the range of eras that this site contains remains from. Some are ancient, some are medieval, some are roman... this is a very good warmup for Greece... almost Greece-lite or an "amuse-bouche" as Scott calls it.
We of course had to stop for gelato on the way back, first of many I'm sure and then had to hoof it fairly quickly to get me back in time for BodyAttack. My legs and feet were already tired and sore from over 20,000 steps...but hey, this is what I came for!
The Les Mills Live event was right on site at the resort about 30 seconds of a walk from our suite. It was in a big event hall. The room was very large and very full and the energy was amazing! I haven't done or taught attack in about a year so it was nice to do it again...and reminded me of how much fun it is when there are so many people doing it together. BodyBalance was next (aka Flow) and then Grit Strength. Unfortunately the only thing they didn't provide was mats so most of us had to use towels on the floor - but we made due. Presenters were mainly from this part of the world... Cyprus, Greece, Israel, UK... and what surprised me the most is that it was all in English.
After a full day of walking and working out, it was already dark (boo) but a little break at the room before we headed out to find dinner. We roamed for a bit and then headed to Cavallini's, an italian restaurant that was highly rated and met a Scottish couple who come to Cyprus every year and had just walked out of the restaurant. They highly recommended it as well. So that sealed the deal. And boy oh boy what a nice meal it was. The service, the atmosphere, the food... from top to bottom, exceptional! We were almost the last ones to leave and they even gave us a parting aperitif... I got a nice banana liqueur and Scott doesn't know what he got (I suspect Cognac lol). We left very full and very happy! (I also got to take some home haha - lunch tomorrow!)
Sunday was an early morning for me with another BodyBalance flexibility session outside on the fake turf field. There is another stage and so 8:30am Balance was on the docket. That was lovely... except when we were all spread-eagled in Happy Baby pose and directly above us all is a hovering drone. Likely filming us I suspect...but geeze, what a time to be swooping over a crowd LOL. That was followed by Grit Cardio, also outside. But first we had to film a group challenge exercise. Les Mills International challenged all the teams around the world to get their groups to do 1 exercise and film it and submit it. We were all up for it...until he told us what it was. Burpee-pushup-flight-sprinter tuck. If you don't know what that is... you don't want to know. HAHA. That said, we did it, twice. On tape... sadly you can't quite see me in it as I'm too far back. But I swear I did it!
Grit Cardio in the sun was a challenge in and of itself. And this one has a beep test in it. Burpee beep test. Good times! We made it though... then it was off to BodyPump and CX (I still won't call it Core). They were the upcoming releases (Jan 2023) so I got a preview and CX is SOOO good! Very excited for that one! The music is fantastic! I got a shoutout from the Cyprus crew who were very excited to have some people come from so far away. The Aussies I believe take the award for having come that farthest. Also there was an American couple... but I was Captain Canada representing and they were lovely wonderful and fun hosts.
BodyPump
I wrapped up the workouts by noon, giving us the afternoon to go back out exploring. This time we went back to the touristy area as we didn't have time to see the castle yesterday. We then had lunch and found a really nice local bakery to score some delicious treats. Baklava anyone? I could have bought the entire store... I held myself back to only 3 different pieces. I also ordered a coffee...but somehow that got mis-heard or misunderstood and I got a frozed chocolate frappe? No idea... it was good... but I'm not sure it even had coffee in it? Scott doesn't think so... lol. The fun of being in another country and not speaking the native language.
We kept going as we only had a bit of daylight left and went through some residential areas and found some anciant Ottoman baths. Unfortunately the site was closed so we don't have any information on it... but so fun to just be walking around a residential neighbourhood and randomly there are ancient ruins, just THERE.
Not far from there we notice another theatre built into the hill side. How many of these do they need in such a small area? The odeon we seen yesterday isn't far from here and this one is even bigger! And again, in the middle of town. Just there. It's wild. We continued up towards it as it looked like we would climb up and look down over it, but what we found was even better. Caves! Or sort of caves... we're really not sure what they are... they are tunnels and rooms built underground in the hill side. So you can climb down into them, there are various chambers and tunnels and they lead out to somewhere else. I wish there would have been information because we have no idea what those were built or used for but a very cool find!
The sunset from the top was also spectacular. We got there just as the sun was setting so go to enjoy it from one of the highest points in the city. And this just confirms my belief that some of the coolest things you'll see, find and do are things that you don't expect to. Things that aren't planned or on the tourist map. Just go explore!
We did hit up the casino, but it's not a casino. It's a small room with about 30 slot machines and a bouncer and a background check to get you in. We went through the motions, each lost 5euro in under 2 minutes and left. Fail! In fairness, the building is large so no idea what's in the rest of it given the casino is itty bitty. And for our last night we hit up Fiesta - this very large sports bar with big bright flashing lights that had been calling us over since day 1. Happy hour every hour after 5pm and so we had a drink, watched Formula 1 and now it's time to get ready to move on to Crete tomorrow.
Cyprus was lovely. We only got to see a very small part of it, but the people are friendly, the weather is fantastic and the scenery and sunsets can't be beat! A bit challenging to get here logistically but 1000% worth it! Would buy again. Also, if you love cats, this is the place for you. Cats everywhere. Not in a nuisance way. Just all over, hanging around. Some are even very friendly... we call him Garfield!
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