The final nine days of August

 I wondered, at the start of the month, whether I would remember to write about the details, albeit mostly rather dull, of a month in Cyprus, semi-aestivating in the air conditioning. 

And suddenly, it's the last stretch... not that September will be significantly cooler, but the days are getting shorter and by the end of September we should at least have stopped using the air conditioning. 

Sunday 23rd

As with every other Sunday, I started by watering the plants, then went for a 2km walk. I'm not keeping my phone with me every moment, as I used to do. So on days when I only walk in the mornings, I don't even register 5,000 steps. I'm more interested in what my app calls 'heart points', ensuring I reach the minimum of twenty if possible, aiming for heart health. 

We were expecting our closest local friends in the afternoon: four of them this time, which is more than usually come now. So I put a loaf of bread on (in the breadmaker), and decided to try a vegan pseudo-'cheesecake' from a recipe I found online some time ago. It suggested a complex crust using seeds, dates and nuts but I thought I'd keep it simple and use a standard cheesecake base with digestive biscuits and spread. Somewhat ultra-processed, but when it gets cooler I'm going to see if I can make digestive biscuits myself, to avoid that problem.

Third week of August in Cyprus

More than half way through August already, another week gets going...

Sunday 16th

Sunday morning I woke around six thirty. It was a tad cooler than it had been. So once again I walked to the Salt Lake park, and explored a bit more than I did last week. I won't go into detail, as I wrote an entire extra post about the upgraded Salt Lake (or Pattichio) park. But here's one photo I took, showing the nature garden, and the steps to the bridge:

By the time I got home, it was getting hot and humid. Another morning in the air conditioning, where I watched some of the church livestream. We'd decided to get a rotisserie chicken from Metro for lunch again, along with various leftovers from the previous week; I knew it would last us at least three meals. We had quite a lot of new potatoes left over, so I sliced and refried them, along with some onions. We ate about half of those. 

Pattichio (Salt Lake) Park upgrade

 Back in February, I wrote this post about ongoing construction in the Salt Lake (Pattichio) Park. It all seemed to be happening slowly and somewhat randomly. By the middle of June, when I stopped going for walks along the Salt Lake trail until the weather cools down, it hadn't progressed all that much. 

So I was amazed to see this article about the Pattichio Park come up in my Facebook feed last week. I decided to go and see what was going on - it was hard to believe that in just a couple of months the upgrade really was complete, but that's what the article said. I mentioned this in the Wednesday part of last week's general rambling update, with a couple of photos. But I didn't stray from the main path, as it was so very hot and humid.

Yesterday morning, however, the temperature was a tad cooler, and not quite so sticky. So I decided to be a bit more adventurous. I walked to the park, then wandered up the first trail I came to:

 
It led to the dog park. This is quite a nice looking area that's fenced off, with plenty of bins for dog mess, to allow dogs to run around rather than having to be on a lead/leash all the time.

Second week of August in Cyprus

Continuing on from my previous post, which covered the first eight days of August...

Sunday 9th August

When I woke, the humidity wasn't too high. My phone told me that the temperature was around 26 degrees at 6am. I read for a bit, then watered the plants on the front porch. We're theoretically allowed to use hose pipes on plants (though not for anything else). However, I feel it's less wasteful to use a watering can, so that's what I do. I have to fill four cans to give all our plants a reasonable amount of water, and they seem to be surviving, some of them blooming quite well.  

Then I walked - slowly - for a couple of kilometres around local streets. As so often, I noticed how much construction is going on in our neighbourhood. Mostly new blocks of flats. There's a housing crisis here as there aren't sufficient affordable homes - yet new ones are going up all the time. 

First week of August in Cyprus

Apparently my unexciting post with a few photos from July was appreciated by others, and of interest to some people who are not in Cyprus. So I thought I'd write a week-by-week summary of August. Assuming I remember to do so, that is. 

In that post, I spoke too soon about the lack of nasty insects. When I was getting ready for bed on the night of July 31st, I opened my closet and saw (shudder....) a roach sitting amid my tee shirts.  Thankfully Richard was close by, and he was able to get rid of it.

Saturday 1st August

August started, as so often happens, with increased humidity. I went out for a shortish walk first thing, around 6am. Although it was only around 26 degrees and I stayed mostly in the shade, I was dripping when I got home. I sat down and did a few puzzles, then - slowly - organised Richard's breakfast tray of fruit and nuts, squeezed oranges etc. I made some oat milk for his coffee and my frappé. Then I had my breakfast, hoping it would give me some energy.

It didn't.  

Half way through summer....?

 The end of July always feels like something of a milestone to me, particularly when we're in Cyprus all summer. The hot weather usually starts to feel uncomfortable by mid-to-late June, and it feels like the end is in sight by mid-to-late September. And yes I know that means that the half-way spot should be about a week into August... but I would prefer it to be today. 

I didn't take many photos in the past month. Much of what interested us was at a distance: my younger son and his wife moved to a new location, where he's now the vicar of a lively church. I watched the installation by livestream, and some of the Sunday services too. My other son and his family made a trip to the Logos Hope, where they spent two years when the children were much younger. Not a long trip, as it docked in Edinburgh for a few days.

But we've stayed in Larnaca, which turns out to have been a good thing, for a variety of reasons. It was important to be here in July because our local friends (and cat-feeders) have mostly been out of the country. And since they have three cats, I was the one who fed them when everyone was away, on about ten or twelve days of the month.

Random Larnaka images for the end of June

 May appeared to last rather a long time. But I'm not sure quite what happened to June.  As it's the last day already, here are some random local photos from the past month that I didn't use in the only other post I wrote in June. I wrote a similar post at the end of May; it may become a trend on this blog. 

We think this is some kind of fashion show that took place in Salina Park early in the month. Everything was set up the evening before, and taken down by the following evening. 

Moving on from spring

 Towards the end of April I wrote about moving on from winter - packing away our warm clothes, duvet etc. In May, we enjoyed slightly cooler weather than usual, and a surprising amount of rain. According to the Cyprus mail, rainfall was more than twice as much as normal for the month. But still there's a potential water problem, and hose pipes are still banned, other than for watering plants.

By the end of May, the temperatures were increasing, though the humidity was still low. It was time to start getting ready for the summer. By July I won't want to do anything much during the daytime. On the last Saturday of May, I did some extra laundry, so I could put away even our thinner jackets, as well as stray gloves and hats that were still out. 

We hang things on lines here, and they were all dry within a couple of hours.