We started off our final day of sight seeing with an hour long bus ride to St. Nicholas of the Roof Church. As soon as we got within sight of the church, I was confused because it does not look like your typical church. All of the other places of worship built during the Byzantine era that we have visited had a dome roof. However, St. Nicholas had a regular roof that looks like the one on my house. However, Demetra explained that this unusual shape is due to the weather in the mountains. It was originally in the shape of a dome, but a normal roof was added after years of expenses on upkeep. Once we entered into the building, we were quickly immersed into a new world of paintings. The entire church is covered from wall to celling in colorful pictures from different time periods. The top of the dome is a picture of Jesus Christ with layers of angels and prophets under him. Since I am not of Christian religion, I did not feel a special religious connection to the stories behind all of the paintings. However, I did feel an utmost amount of respect for the painters of these paintings. They were done with a fresco paining technique which allowed them to be preserved to well and seen in so much detail. The detail and colors on all of the paintings were extremely intricate and I could tell how much work was put into them. It was an extremely meaningful experience to be in a place that has so much heart and passion put into it.
After finishing the tour of the paintings, we took another (but thankfully shorter) bus ride to the Kakopetria Village that faces the Troodos mountains. As soon as we started walking, I could tell that the scenery was very different from any of the other sites that we have visited. Instead of a tourist town with lots of souvenir shops and beaches, Kakopetria has cobblestone streets with green plants as far as the eye can see. On our way to the old city we saw so many different types of trees such as pomegranate, lemon, and bay leaf. The walk up the hill had little streams and pieces of artwork, such as the picture of the heart that I included below. At one point on the hill there is a hotel and restaurant that was built to look like the older architecture of all of the other buildings. It is a tall yet gorgeous building made with materials like volcanic black rock and bamboo. There is another stone building next to it which was used to mill wheat and store the donkeys that delivered the flour. As we continued up the hill we passed through cobblestone streets filled with flowers and alleyways that look right out of a picture book. There is another point that looks over a village of picture-perfect houses with the mountains in the background. At the top of the hill there was a restaurant that had a woodsy interior that we ate our buffet lunch at. After the lunch a group of us walked around (to take instagram pictures of course) and then went to a few cute boutiques. Since it was our last historical tour, we unfortunately had to say goodbye to Demetra. However, all of the stories and wisdom she gave us during her time will not be forgotten!
