Solution to the water problem in Cyprus

Really Innovative solution to the water problem in Cyprus! As you can see, innovation always has its risks, but the results are sure to quench your thirst!

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2nd Euro Mediterranean Folkloric Festival in Limassol

This is the second edition of the Euro Mediterranean festival in Cyprus, after the one in 2007. The photo above is from the last year's show. I saw the posters for this while driving around yesterday and was surprised to know that it was starting today (Aug 4th, 2008). There was very little publicity for this event and there was not even a single place online where i could get the details. Somehow, i managed to get the phone number of the Cyprus municipality and they were courteous enough to fax me the complete schedule. If you are in Limassol for any of the 4 days below, do go to this show. It is a cultural extravaganza with different kinds of dances/instruments and for the photographer in you, it is a great opportunity to improve your skills at taking photos at a stage concert.
This year, there seem to be groups which were not present last year. Some of the highlights of this year's show are:

• Cyprus: Dionysos cultural and dancing group from Limassol, Konta Stin Paradosi Group, Alexandra traditional dancing workshop and the limassol cultural association. I hope that the Cypriots do something different from the usual sitting down, touching one leg and the hopping back thing!
• Greece: Cultural Group Arcadi
• Hungary: Folk dance group Csepel
• Italy: Folklore group Marsala Antica
• Czech Republic: Folklore group Lipina Vracov
• Latvia: Dance Ensemble Bitite
• Egypt: Floklore Group Malawi

The festival is from the 4th of August to 8th of August. The schedule is as follows;

• 4th Aug: Downtown area, District Administration Office: 19:30, parade of the groups; 20:30, performance of the groups
• 5th Aug: Performance at the courtyard of Panayia Chrisaifiliotisa church (where is this?) at Agia Fyla
• 6th Aug: Performance at the "Kostas Partasides Park" at Agios Nicolas
• 7th Aug: Performance at the courtyard ofAgia Varvara churc at Zakaki
• 8th Aug: 19:30; Parade of the groups from the Limasosl Municipal Gardens to the Old Port, 20:30;Performance at the old port and then the closing ceremony.

If you get a chance, do visit the performance on one of the days, it is really good!

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Trek to an isolated beach near Pissouri Village in Cyprus

If you can call any trek dramatic, then it has to be this one. The views and the thrills offered by this trek are amazing and this has to be one of the best coastal treks in Cyprus. I found this trek from a book called "Walks in Cyprus", but this is a very old book and the directions don't hold good any longer as he refers to "a building under construction" in many places as references and they are obviously no longer in that state.
Highlights of this trek
- Excellent photo opportunities with the cliffs and the sea
- An isolated beach at the end of the trek, reachable only by boat or through this walk
- Pissouri Village is just a short drive away from Paphos/Limassol

Things to note if you are going on this trek
- You need good shoes with a strong grip as almost the entire route consists of just barren loose rocks and is very slippery. Some sections of this trek are extremely close to the edge of the cliff, so you wouldn't want to risk "slipping" over the edge!
- Take lot of water. Even the downhill section gets tiring. It takes approximately an hour and a half (with lot of photo breaks) to go downhill and an equal amount of time uphill. Uphill is much easier.
- The best time to do this walk is in early winter or in spring. You are totally exposed to the elements on this walk and it can get very hot/cold if you are walking in the peak seasons.

How to get to the starting point of the trek: The treks starts from the top of the hill on which Pissouri village is located. Pissouri village is a short drive from Limassol/Paphos. Once you drive up to the centre of Pissouri, keep on going straight (there is only one narrow road) until you come to a fork in the centre of the road. Take the left and keep going. You should always be on the "main" road and not venture into the small exits which lead to apartment complexes. After a while you should see a tall tower somewhere at the end of the road. This is supposed to be a military complex. Park anywhere near the apartments before the tower complex and walk around the tower to go behind it. You should hit a trail clearly visible at the edge of the cliff. Start walking towards the right (west) towards the beach. That's it, you are on your way.

I have been on this trek three times. The first time, we didn't know the correct starting point, tried to find a way ourselves ( we knew we had to reach the beach, it should be easy to find a way!), got lost and ended up on a cliff which had no way out! The second time, we took a better approach, followed a stream's course (They all have to flow into the sea, right) and ended up at the top of the 20 foot waterfall which we obviously couldn't climb down. But, we managed to climb up the sides and find the correct path and we reached the beach. The third time ( very experienced now!), we went on the correct path. I am writing about all the three attempts below. So, if you are just interested in the correct way, scroll down to the third story. But, you might miss some good photographs if you do so :-)

First (unsuccessful) attempt:

We didn't quite understand the map drawn in the book for this particular trek. There was a mention of a goat enclosure. We found one, assumed that this was the one mentioned and started walking in the direction of the beach. After 10 minutes, we realised that there was no way that this could have been the correct way, but we decided to press on anyway. We also saw a herd of mountain goats on the way and felt happy that we were not the only living beings around. We finally reached a cliff beyond which, we concluded, there was no safe path towards the sea.(the place where Gopal is standing in the first pic above) So, we started climbing the cliffs and rocks on this cliff for lot of photo ops. Looking back, this attempt was lot of fun as it was totally investigative in nature and at some places, it was a real struggle to keep going.

Second attempt (Took lot of time, but finally made it):

This time Puneeth gave the suggestion of following the path of what would have been a stream in the rainy season(The path in the first photo above). It was an interesting suggestion and we enjoyed the initial part of the walk. Since we were following the stream, we had to walk through narrow gorges, over rocks and some pretty slippery terrain. The most fun was to climb down the places where there would have been a waterfall in the rainy season. We did climb down quite a few of them, some even around 6-7 feet tall. Puneeth and i decided to follow the exact path of the stream which meant scrambling through thorny bushes into steep gorges while others preferred the safer longer route.

The path became more and more meandering (we were enjoying it). Then as i was walking around a blind corner, i came to a waterfall. Good that i had been walking slowly, otherwise, i cannot imagine the situation i could have been in. The fall was more than 10-12 feet high and there was no way we could climb down the wall. We had no option but to look for other routes. But, we were stuck in a gorge with steep walls on either side. We didn't want to retrace our route, so we took the decision to climb the walls. It was tough, but we managed it and continued on "top of the stream" towards the sea. Luckily, we saw two other trekkers in the distance, the kind who come out with a backpack and walking sticks (the so-called pros) and they seemed to know where they were going. So, we went in their direction and found something resembling a track. We realised that this was the elusive path we had been looking for and finally managed to reach the beach. Btw, this was the first and only trek in which Parthipan was short of breath and needed rest!

Third Attempt (Now, we are pros on this trek!):
So, to continue from the initial paragraphs, once you park near the tower complex, go around it (from the left) and keep going towards the edge of the cliff. There you will see a clear goat-path going towards the right. This is the track you should take. All along the track you will see markers put by trekkers (even we have contributed to quite a few of them) consisting of few rocks on top of each other. So, if you see them, you know for sure that you are on the right track. There are even markers on the beach to tell you that you have reached the correct beach !!

The path can get slippery at places and it was interesting to see the approaches taken by my friends in overcoming those obstacles!

i was the first to reach the beach and has some good opportunities to take photos of the rest of the gang climb down.

Don't forget to take lot of breaks during the trek for taking photographs. If the weather turns out to be fine, you can get some real nice pictures. Enjoy the trek and drop in a comment about your experience!

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Dogstock Jazz Music Festival in Pomos, Cyprus

This year's dogstock festival is going to happen at "Paradise Place" in Pomos, Cyprus on August 25th. This festival is self-organised by some professional and amateur musicians and has proven to be a big hit over the last years. One more reason to visit this festival is that you don't need to bother about accommodation. All you have to do is to get yourself a tent and go over to the Polis camping site nearby.

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2nd Euro-Mediterranean Festival in Limassol

If you are reading this (before August 10th) and you still haven't watched the show, WATCH IT! It happened on August 6th (in Downtown Limassol) and August 7th(inside the Municiapal Gardens Theatre) and will happen on August 9th at Ayias Fylas/Zakaki (not sure where exactly) and on August 10th on the sea-front near the Old Port. I went to this show on Thursday not expecting much out of it. But, it was awesome. So, I went again yesterday, this time with my camera, to the Municipal Gardens and it was much better here with proper seating and a good view of the stage. There were some new sequences on the second day probably because this was a proper stage with a Green room etc where artists could change costumes and do more than one sequence. Enjoy the photographs below and don't forget to watch the show.

There were artists from many countries in Europe like Belgium, Serbia, Bulgaria (or was it Belgrade/Serbia), Greece and of course Cyprus.

The girl in the photograph below, from serbia, had the crowd behind her and she could have put any belly dancer to shame with her amazing dance sequence.

When i was in switzerland, I had been to Pilatus near Lucerne. There, they had these long horns (called as alphorns) on display. This was the first time i was hearing them being played. The sound was amazing and it looked like they were just controlling it with the way they blew air into the horn.

When the group from Belgium came on stage, i was wondering as to what they are going to do with flags. They showed a lot of things that can be done with them! They threw the flags high up in the air in unison and caught it perfectly in tune with the beats of the song. Their choreography was great and the music was even greater. In fact, one of the songs was played has been directly copied in one of Indian movie songs. I guess we should appreciate the Indian music directors for spending so much time on research and look for remote folk songs to copy over! According to one of the commentors on this post, this group/folk-art is called "Flago" in the esperanto language (the universal language). You can see more details about this group at the Flago Website.

Yes, i took photos of guys too. One of them had funny looking shoes! One group did an interesting sequence standing on a pot.

The group from Serbia was the best of the lot with the girls performing a routine lasting for almost 15 minutes with a very fast beat and some amazing co-ordination!

and, of course, we had the cypriots and the greeks doing their thing of getting around in a circle and watching a guy sit down/stand up/touch his leg and doing the rest of the things which they usually do.

Hope you enjoyed the photos and if you are reading this before 10th, don't miss the show.

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Cyprus Wine Festival 2007 in Limassol

The Wine Festival in Limassol is an annual affair which started in the year 1961. The festival is staged inside the Limassol Municipal Gardens. It usually goes on for a fortnight with fireworks displays on the first and last days. This year, the festival is from August 28th to September 9th. It is a very popular event with thousands of visitors, some even coming from outside Cyprus especially for this event.

All the local manufacturers of wine come to this festival and give free samples to all the visitors. So it is heyday for all those in search of free booze. I visit this festival every year though I am a teetotaller. The festival not only has wine stalls, but also has shows of many local dances and lots of games to play. I go these especially for the games. I have been lucky at times too. Below are two pictures (from pre-SLR days). The first one shows the statue of the man synonymous with the wine festival which is the first thing to go up leading to the preparations for the wine festival. The second photo was taken by me and the stuff held by the guy on the left (a stuffed dog and the Red Indian Wall Hanging) were won by me in a raffle.

Btw, i went to the wine festival on the opening day last week and you can see photos here.

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