Somewhere that was not built for you.
Forty-five minutes west on the A3. A room that stops at a hundred pizzas a day, which is not how a resort restaurant behaves.
- Distance58 km
- Drive45 min
- RoadA3
You have been eating in places designed around visitors all week.
Nothing wrong with that — resorts exist to look after people on holiday, and Ayia Napa is very good at it. But after a few days everything starts to feel like it was written for you rather than simply being there.
The tell is usually the menu: laminated, in four languages, and long enough to require an index.
Here the ceiling is a hundred pizzas a day. A place aimed at tourist volume would never do that, because turning people away is the one thing that business model cannot survive.
One road, straight, most of the way.
The A3 runs from the Ayia Napa end of the island past the airport and around Larnaca — about fifty-eight kilometres, roughly forty-five minutes. Protaras and Paralimni add a few minutes at the start.
It is the road you already took from the airport when you arrived, driven in the other direction.
If you are here for a week, a weeknight is the right night: the road is empty and so is the ceiling on the dough.
And if you live out there, this matters more in January.
Ayia Napa and Protaras empty out at the end of the season. A lot of what is open in August is shuttered by November, and if you live in that corner of the island the winter choice narrows sharply.
Larnaca does not do that. It is a working town with an airport in it, so it stays open, and so do we — Tuesday to Sunday, all year, apart from a fortnight in August when Daniele goes to the beach like everybody else.
Forty-five minutes is a lot in July. In January it is nothing.
Come along the coast.
Tuesday to Sunday, six until ten. Order the Cypriot wine while you are here — you will not find it on many lists in the resorts.
The things people actually ask.
Q.How far is Larnaca from Ayia Napa?
About 58 kilometres. The drive takes roughly forty-five minutes on the A3 motorway, which runs past Larnaca airport. Protaras and Paralimni are a few minutes further out.
Q.Where can I find authentic Italian food near Ayia Napa?
Filomena Pizzeria Napoletana in Larnaca, about forty-five minutes west on the A3, makes Neapolitan pizza with 48-hour biga dough, San Marzano tomatoes and fior di latte from Italy, in a copper gas oven at 400°C. It is open Tuesday to Sunday, 6pm to 10pm.
Q.Is it open out of season?
Yes. Filomena is in Larnaca, a year-round town, and opens Tuesday to Sunday throughout the year. The one exception is a two-week summer closure in August.