Exploring castles and wandering streets.

If you want to understand today, you have to search yesterday. ~Pearl Buck

Saturday was a day of exploring castles and wandering streets. There were four of us who decided to meander the beautiful streets of Lemesos (Limmesol), instead of focusing on the beach.

First, we went to the Lemesos Castle (also known as the Cyprus Medieval Museum). Somewhere on the grounds of this castle, which is undergoing renovations, was a chapel where Richard the Lionheart got married.

From the outside, this stone structure doesn't seem all that glamorous. Inside is where all the surprises can be found. It is a museum devoted to medieval life in Cyprus. There were sets of armor, there were coins stretching across centuries, there was pottery and weaponry galore.

This castle seemed to have a massive amount of tombstones. Some were knights, some were church leaders, some were families. There were tombstones from all different people. There were some that had been retrieved from mosques, but most were from churches.

These tombstones showed the most damage, however, most of it seemed created by human hands. Although there were no signs to explain this, many of the faces on the stones had been damaged in a way that was purposefully done. As if someone was simply stabbing or scratching at these.

I have to admit, my favorite part was probably the roof. Simply because of the view. I kept imagining what it would have been like to have been a part of that family or somehow have lived in that house before the town built up around it. There would have been clear, unaltered views of the Mediterranean Sea.

The history of these castles is so mesmerizing that it makes it easy to wander for hours. Not to say it was all good or bad, simply mesmerizing (the meaning of which is probably not that simple in actuality). To realize that someone has lived, moved, and breathed within the stone walls that now are covered in tourists...well, that's a bit of a jolt to the system.

Later, we wandered the streets of Lemesos, seemingly far away from the beachfront and the tourist shops. We found some great souvenirs and talked with some more nice people. It was a continued adventure in creating our own history among these century-old streets.