Today has been cloudy – apart from my first morning up in the hills, the first time I’ve seen cloud since I got here in mid-July. I suppose I can’t complain.  It brightened up this afternoon and I got to have my swim, finding myself the only person on the whole of the beach.  Kostas told me today that the wind was due to drop tomorrow – down to two “Beaufor” (cross your fingers and toes, please!).

Yesterday I caught the bus into town and had an impromptu bit of sight-seeing on the way back as the bus did a detour to the big church for Sunday day trippers getting off the ferries.

It has been blowy.  This is the very handy windsock at the helipad just by my bus stop.

The wind is from the north about 95% of the time, so I don’t know if there’s much point in it.

In town I shopped at the market for the first time (I don’t usually make it into town until early evening when the day is cooling down and the market is long shut).  The market is tiny and just a bunch of local farmers and smallholders selling their produce.  I felt a bit sorry for the guy who was just selling tomatoes – I selected three and put them in a bag – the guy weighed them, frowned then without a workd of explanation added a fourth and said “50 cents” .  I got a melon and some nectarines but couldn’t see cucumbers, so resorted to the supermarket for those.

On my way back from the supermarket I saw that the pelican was out for a volta.  He spends each night perched on a trellis in a small fishmonger shop but gets out and about during the day – he has a trick of reaching up to taverna tables and pinching the salt and pepper pots.

I found some halloumi in the supermarket (it’s from Cyprus) and decided to take a chance on the frying pan – the frying pan used to be non stick but has seen better days.  The cheese and I, with the help of a fish-slice were victorious.  Mmmmm – squeaky cheese!

and as I was finishing off the hoummus I made a couple of days ago it was quite a cypriot angle to the evening’s menu.