Day 21: Nicosia

Trip

Greece+Cyprus 2025

Location

Nicosia 🇨🇾

Date

October 3, 2025

Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, has a rich history that dates back over 5,500 years, with continuous habitation since the Chalcolithic era around 3000 B.C. It became the capital of Cyprus in the 10th century during Byzantine rule–because if you’re going to become a capital why not do it when the Macedonian were in charge. Throughout its history, Nicosia was ruled successively by the Byzantines, Lusignan kings, Venetians (that’s where the many fortifications on the island come from), Ottomans, and the British. The British used Cyprus as a colony from 1878 until its independence in 1960.

The city was divided between Cyprus and Turkey due to tensions between Greek and Turkish Cypriots that led to violent clashes in 1963–you’re just finished with one nation-defining struggle, it sure seems like 3 years later is the best time to start a new one…. During those, the city was informally partitioned, and a “Green Line” was drawn on the map to separate the communities. This line gained international recognition as a demarcation point maintained by the United Nations after ongoing violence throughout the 1960s and early 1970s. The division was cemented in July 1974, when events escalated to the point where the Turkish military intervened. Turkey, citing protection of Turkish Cypriots, occupies the northern third of the island, and established control over what became the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus—a country recognized only by, you’ve guessed it, Turkey. The ceasefire line from 1974, known as the Green Line, was extended across the entire country cutting Nicosia in half.

While the Berlin wall fell in 1990, one might think Nicosia is the last divided city. It is not but it is the last where a strict and enforced border between sides exists. As an example of divided cities in Europe take Baarle. It is a border village that is located both in Belgium and the Netherlands but operates as two municipalities: Baarle-Nassau in the Netherlands and Baarle-Hertog in Belgium. They didn’t go with a straight line instead they went with a complex border consisting of 22 small Belgian enclaves within the Dutch territory and several Dutch counter-enclaves within those Belgian enclaves. Of course, if it was strictly enforced by the UN it would have its work cut out for them.

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TL;DR:

Nicosia is divided in two.
The south of the city is in Cyprus,
The north is in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus; a country recognized only by Turkey itself.
There are customs for each country on each side of the UN managed green zone.

So that’s where we’re heading today… We started our day by breakfast at 📍St.Art cafe. Based on our research it was a good contender for both coffee and breakfast and havs a good terrace. The terrace doesn’t have a view normally but, for our visit, we were treated to road construction. Not the best for ambiance. The breakfast itself was pretty good and the coffee ok, not specialty coffee level but skilled enough.

From our breakfast we proceeded straight to the car and headed on the one hour drive to Nicosia. The bulk of it was on a highway so not much need to remember what’s a large and a small turn. We didn’t want to make our life hard and drive into the walled portion of Nicosia, where the bulk of what we want to see is. Karine found us a parking garage on the edge of the wall that was perfect (📍Parking Omirou)

From there we went to the 📍The Cyprus Museum (also known as the Archeological Museum). The museum was under renovation, cutting out access to a room and a half (out of 15ish). It could have been called the figurines museum. Contrary to a lot of archeological museums where you get to look at lots of pots reconstruction, this museum has quite a large number of figurines. The rooms being mostly organized by theme more than strict period range, we got to appreciate how the representation of people changed over time. There is the obligatory pottery and tomb stones because, that’s where you buried people with things and didn’t disturb them for a very long time. That got me thinking that whomever was in charge of burial rights and setting standards probably had a kickback system with the potters and blacksmiths of the land. Burning a guy with a ton of offerings in pots and his favourite cauldron must have created a lot of repeat business for them. A different version of planned obsolescence maybe?

From there we started our exploration of the walled city, first scouting two of the three original city gates on the Cyprus side (📍Paphos and 📍Famagusta). Our way between the two gates went by the📍Omeriye Mosque (which we were not dressed to enter and was in the middle of prayer) and the 📍The House of Hadjigeorgakis Kornesios (which was closed). We then proceeded to cross to the north of Nicosia through the 📍UN zone. Neither the Cyprus side or the Turkish side stamped our passports.

As soon as we were in the northen portion of the city we noticed the difference. First you enter the 📍Bazar which is tailor-made to extract tourist from their money and you can see the displays of sweets with more nuts in them than sugar. Also, in our typical timing, we choose to visit the primordially musliM part of the city on a Friday when most places are closed or closing early (at the exception of the bazar and restaurants in tourist areas).

We headed for the concentration of sites to visit. The 📍Buyuk khan mosque (no longer a mosque but ocupied by artists), the 📍Bedesten (old church), 📍Selimiye Camii (a mosque inside a church), 📍The Eaved House (closed when we got there), 📍Lusignan House (closed when we got there). We kept going all the way to the last gate to complete our quest to collect all the gates; the📍Kyrenia Gate. What that walk all the way to the northern tip of the walled city showed us is how the living conditions on the Turkish side of the city seem quite a bit harder than on the Cyprus side. It’s hard to judge just by walking around so take the last comment with a grain of salt.

So, we had a long walk across one city in two countries…ish and entered a single building—not that we were expecting to enter any religious sites with me in a tank top and shorts and my complete lack of interest in religious sites, pick which ever reason makes the most sense to you.Then Counting all the stops, s including a quick hydration stop on our way to the car, it took us 4 hours and 10 minutes to do it all. For sure not being able to visit anything other than the Archeological museum helped keep the time down.in our book, h.

We got back to the Airbnb. We spent some time relaxing before going out for an apéro at 📍Secret Garden followed by dinner at 📍Grill Chef. We wanted something simple and meaty and the Grill delivered.