A long day walking on gravel roads around the Akamas peninsula.
6:30 am and I was up and watching the colours on the cliffs opposite and in the clouds. It had rained during the night and the black rain clouds, tinged orange by the distant sun were still a forbidding presence. I had been tossing in the sweaty heat last night, all but naked on top of my sleeping bag so I was glad of the rain which cooled the air and allowed me to drift into a peaceful slumbers.
As I munched on a biscuit for breakfast, sandflies were trying to bite my legs, so pretty as the beach was, I was keen to be on my way. After my experience yesterday, I was expecting to be troubled by passing vehicles, but only a police car, two white pickups and two cyclists passed me until I reached the north coast in the afternoon. Nevertheless, the E4 follows the dirt road, initially two lanes wide and later single track, for some 30 kilometres. It does not give the feel of being among remote nature, even though there were no buildings in sight between Lara Bay and the Bath of Aphrodite.
Signs drew attention to the rare coastal juniper bushes which clothe the peninsula. As they are rare their habitat is protected by an EU directive and I have seen several examples where my walk across Europe has touched the sea. The Junipers beside the road are coated with dust raised by passing vehicles, I cannot imagine it does them much good, it is certainly unattractive. There are also pine trees, goats (including pretty brown ones and ones with long beards) and lizards on the peninsula, and birds that flapped into flight like small grouse at my approach.
The fine white dust on the road was from the limestone, which outcrops as cliffs and hills or forms the shoreline, where it can be corroded by water into fantastical shapes with sharp edges. In places, older darker serpentine rock shows through. You can see lovely green colours and veining if you wet it.
The E4 drops down to the north coast of the peninsula at Fontana Amoroza, a bay with exceedingly blue water. Land Rovers were providing a regular run transporting people there from the Bath of Aphrodite, and others were arriving by boat. Some people were trying to make the trip in their rental cars, very slowly, but the dips and bumps in the road and the soft dust makes this look unwise, especially as a section of the single track road has a very steep drop on one side.
Although you were not allowed to bath in the Bath of Aphrodite it was a pleasant spot and the area around it had informative signs giving the names for different local trees and bushes. There was also a stall selling ice cream and coke outside, which I felt obliged to patronise.
A little further down the road I reached the Aphrodite beach hotel. Finding the entrance proved a little difficuly, mislead by the signs, and I entered via the back past the washing. After checking in I went down to the beach for a swim. I thought compared with some on the beach I looked quite fit, sadly I spoilt the impression of masculinity by teetering into the sea, my bare feet very sensitive to the pebbles, it probably looked like I was doing an impression of walking over a bed of nails...
31 kilometres walked today and a 520 metre total ascent. A gps file of my route can be found on wikiloc.com, and on myViewRanger under short code johnpon0044.
6:30 am and I was up and watching the colours on the cliffs opposite and in the clouds. It had rained during the night and the black rain clouds, tinged orange by the distant sun were still a forbidding presence. I had been tossing in the sweaty heat last night, all but naked on top of my sleeping bag so I was glad of the rain which cooled the air and allowed me to drift into a peaceful slumbers.
As I munched on a biscuit for breakfast, sandflies were trying to bite my legs, so pretty as the beach was, I was keen to be on my way. After my experience yesterday, I was expecting to be troubled by passing vehicles, but only a police car, two white pickups and two cyclists passed me until I reached the north coast in the afternoon. Nevertheless, the E4 follows the dirt road, initially two lanes wide and later single track, for some 30 kilometres. It does not give the feel of being among remote nature, even though there were no buildings in sight between Lara Bay and the Bath of Aphrodite.
Signs drew attention to the rare coastal juniper bushes which clothe the peninsula. As they are rare their habitat is protected by an EU directive and I have seen several examples where my walk across Europe has touched the sea. The Junipers beside the road are coated with dust raised by passing vehicles, I cannot imagine it does them much good, it is certainly unattractive. There are also pine trees, goats (including pretty brown ones and ones with long beards) and lizards on the peninsula, and birds that flapped into flight like small grouse at my approach.
The fine white dust on the road was from the limestone, which outcrops as cliffs and hills or forms the shoreline, where it can be corroded by water into fantastical shapes with sharp edges. In places, older darker serpentine rock shows through. You can see lovely green colours and veining if you wet it.
The E4 drops down to the north coast of the peninsula at Fontana Amoroza, a bay with exceedingly blue water. Land Rovers were providing a regular run transporting people there from the Bath of Aphrodite, and others were arriving by boat. Some people were trying to make the trip in their rental cars, very slowly, but the dips and bumps in the road and the soft dust makes this look unwise, especially as a section of the single track road has a very steep drop on one side.
Although you were not allowed to bath in the Bath of Aphrodite it was a pleasant spot and the area around it had informative signs giving the names for different local trees and bushes. There was also a stall selling ice cream and coke outside, which I felt obliged to patronise.
A little further down the road I reached the Aphrodite beach hotel. Finding the entrance proved a little difficuly, mislead by the signs, and I entered via the back past the washing. After checking in I went down to the beach for a swim. I thought compared with some on the beach I looked quite fit, sadly I spoilt the impression of masculinity by teetering into the sea, my bare feet very sensitive to the pebbles, it probably looked like I was doing an impression of walking over a bed of nails...
31 kilometres walked today and a 520 metre total ascent. A gps file of my route can be found on wikiloc.com, and on myViewRanger under short code johnpon0044.
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| My tent on Lara baech |
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| The E4 around the Akamas Peninsula |
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| A goat checks me out |
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| Fontana Amoroza or the Blue Lagoon |
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