Author Topic: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu  (Read 6378 times)

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Offline Colwyn

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Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« on: June 21, 2017, 15:51:57 PM »
We had been to this area some 15 years ago. A CBF member living in TRNC had warned me it would find it had changed considerably. So it had. We stayed  in Karaolanoglu a couple of miles along the coast from Kyrenia. 15 years ago it was a village clearly separate from Kyrenia: today the road along the north coast is lined, both sides, the whole way - lined with glass-plated shops, car salesrooms, banks, Burger Worlds and Chicken Planets - and you cannot tell where one place finishes and the next place starts. Cars, vans, lorries and dolmuses thunder by, in a near continuous stream all day long. So much so that that pedestrian find it difficult to cross the road. But there aren't any pedestrians, except for us, since everyone is in a vehicle - even for a short journey of a couple of hundred yards. Fortunately, once you are off this drag and onto sidestreets towards the coast (a hundred yards away) you enter a different and far more pleasant world. Quiet and beautiful, but only 15 minutes by dolmus to Kyrenia.

Offline Colwyn

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #1 on: June 21, 2017, 16:20:14 PM »
Kyrenia Harbour

Kyrenia Harbour is quite simply splendid. I haven't been seen a better Venetian harbour on my travels. The harbour has a castle on one side and is lined with flat-top building many of which have restaurants on the roof. In front of these buildings is a promenade which, on the Sunday we first visited, was thronged with promenaders - mostly Turkish Cypriots I believe. We sat in comfortable cane chairs and sipped our drinks whilst enjoying the parade.

Harbour



Castle




Promenade




In the background you can see the Five Finger Mountain Range (Besparnak/Pentadaktylos). More of this later.

Offline Daffodil

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #2 on: June 21, 2017, 16:32:32 PM »
Really interesting Colwyn, lovely to see the photographs.

Offline BernieTeyze

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #3 on: June 21, 2017, 17:02:28 PM »
That looks nice. I think I could try there.

Offline Rana

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #4 on: June 21, 2017, 21:24:03 PM »
Beautiful Colwyn,  thanks for sharing. Brings back lovely memories. I think that was the Hotel we stayed in on the right of your promenade picture. A beautiful boutique hotel.

Offline Scunner

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #5 on: June 21, 2017, 21:38:38 PM »
How much is an Efes?

Offline philrose

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #6 on: June 22, 2017, 05:12:24 AM »
How much is an Efes?
Cheaper than Calis..... :)

Offline Colwyn

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #7 on: June 22, 2017, 09:06:39 AM »
How much is an Efes?
As it happens my next topic was to be "Food & Drink". Efes = 8/10/12 TL and one shack offering it at 5TL. Of course we avoid the cheaper places due to the Brit riff-raff you tend to find there.

Offline Laura B

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #8 on: June 22, 2017, 09:27:10 AM »
As I am sure you know Colwyn, most of the buildings around the harbour are the old carob warehouses.   Good to read your reviews. Thanks.

Offline Colwyn

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Re: Turkish Not Turkey: Kyrenia & Karaolanoglu
« Reply #9 on: June 22, 2017, 09:38:24 AM »
Food & Drink

From what we saw, the restaurant meals were traditionally Turkish: humus and halloumi, kebabs and koftes. There was also a Turkish version of the Greek meze presentation for which I was unprepared. Once, many years ago, we had had a Greek meze in a village in the mountains above Paphos. It was 24 courses delivered 4 dishes at a time starting with delicacies such as quail egg with spinach on a tiny saucer and increasing in size every course until the conclusion included a near full stifado and a full kleftico. I hadn't realized the Turks had their rival version.

The first evening I ordered a meze at a place where no English was spoken and my limited Turkish was extremely rusty. I thought I had negotiated a meal of mixed meze and a bottle of raki to go with it. Sure enough, the raki turned up with six little dishes of meze - humus, halloumi, some stuff that looked like ezme by wasn't, and so on. Then ... a huge plate arrived with chips, salad, and a couple of lamb chops ... and lamb sis, and lamb stuffed vine leaves, and chicken sis, and fried liver. It was enormous. I no longer have a huge appetitite but I had thought that when the menu said it was 40TL it wouldn't be too big. Wrong. I did my best.

For beer  - Efes was, of course, ubiquitous and the occasional Tuborg or other. And for wine - there was Turkish ... And French, and Spanish, and Italian, and so on internationally. Splendid. "We'll have a bottle of Chilean Malbec please. 50TL? Fine."




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