It’s been a mixed day. It started with some good apple juice and some good toast, made with a conveyor toaster – but no butter. Dry toast, apple juice, a bowl of cereal and then out to see Larnaca’s famous salt lake, which the guidebook said looks white. It doesn’t. It looks like an ordinary lake. It’s a great sight, with mountains in the distance and Larnaca on its edge and a mosque at the other edge and if you zoom in with your camera, the white speckles you assumed to be seagulls turned out to be actual pink flamingos. But it was hot. It’s January and based on the temperature of the open walls I found while attempting to depart the fourth floor via the stairs instead of the lift, I thought I’d want my hoodie. I did not. I definitely didn’t want my big boots but that’s all I brought with me. I’m expecting Georgia to be cold. I was expecting Cyprus to be warmer but I wasn’t expecting it to be hot. I spent a while admiring the lake but my plan to stroll some of the way round it wasn’t going to happen. Back to the hotel. Maybe spend the afternoon in the pool.

Actually, the hotel is quite cool and so is the balcony, mostly because it’s not facing into the sun. I was quite chilly, in fact. So I forgot how hot it is outside and decided to go back out into Larnaca. It was a lot more tolerable. I don’t know if that’s because I headed south and walked along the seafront, cooled by a sea breeze or if the temperature really did drop. I walked along the same prom I did last night, saw the sea sparkling in the sun, saw how shallow it is and how clear and wished I could put my feet in it and walked up until I found Larnaca town. I had a quick visit to the castle, which is mostly interesting in that you can go up on the ramparts and look out at the beach and the sea from up there. Then I went looking for a supermarket. Google Maps and Reddit between them seem to suggest there are only two decent supermarkets in all Larnaca. One is just around the corner from my hotel – but closed on Sundays. The other is Lidl, just out of the north of the town. I’m staying just out of the south of the town. The mini supermarket in the centre of Larnaca didn’t have bread. Fine. I still have Pringles and half a bar of orange Rittersport that I picked up at the airport. I can live off that (I can’t live off that). But there was a Burger King. I shouldn’t go in Burger King when I’m away adventuring but I was hungry. I ordered chips & Sprite and then was punished for going in Burger King by having to wait forever because the drink machine had broken. Orders were piling up, trays were piling up, burgers and chips were put on their trays and then taken away and put on the warming tray because the machine wouldn’t work. The audacity of one customer – when it finally began spitting out liquid, two staff began making the drinks to go with about ten orders, getting them out as quick as possible, and this moron looked at this drink that he’d been waiting at least 20 minutes for, at the staff trying to pour as many drinks as humanly possibly from a malfunctioning machine and went “… I don’t want ice in it”. I think I would have said quite firmly “Today you do”. I was out in a t-shirt because it’s warm but you can spot the tourists, they’re the only ones who think it’s warm. The locals are all in jumpers and most of them with coats or jackets over the top. It was cooler than first thing in the morning, or cooler than it was by the lake maybe, but if I had three layer on, I’d probably die. I have no idea how I”m going to get all my warm clothes to the airport in the morning if I can’t wear them.

Anyway, by the time I’d eaten my chips, there was a big black cloud forming over Larnaca. The sky was still blue over the Med and further down the prom but there was a coolish breeze and I began to feel like I’d better get home because it was going to end up as a race between me and the rain. I won, and I took a few minutes out of the race to make friends with a cat. There are hundreds of cats here and this one stared at me and meowed and then came over and rubbed itself on my legs and then nearly came home with me.

And that’s about all I’ve done today. I’ve planned breakfast, I’ve planned to do my walk in the morning and I’ve planned what bus I need to be at the airport on time. I’ve planned to go to either the Carrefour between the metro and my hotel in Tbilisi or the Spar across the river if I arrive after 8pm and I plan to eat my body weight in bread tomorrow.