Le Chateau Lambousa – my new favourite hotel in Kyrenia. Matt spent his birthday in the battlement-clad Roman Hotel in Paphos and I was to spend my birthday weekend in a slightly more serious version. With battlements too – of course.

I’ve written before about all the reasons why I love Kyrenia. It really is my Happy Place. We’ve been loads of times and we usually stay in Hotel Pia Bella, near the town centre. However, this year I fancied a change and I’m so pleased I did.

We’ve been going to Hotel Pia Bella for three years and I have loads of happy memories there. I’ve recommended it on this blog and to many of my friends. But our stay last year didn’t go so well. The hotel has expanded and changed. Peaceful breakfasts on The Terrace overlooking a lush courtyard have been replaced by breakfast in a bland hall next to the noisy, dusty road. Last year, our room was in the main building just above reception and overlooking the busy road. It was so noisy that I only got a few hours sleep. There were no fire doors to muffle the voices echoing up from reception. People were talking just beneath our window, the engines of buses left running while they waited for their late-night passengers. Nightmare. I was pregnant and tired and the weekend was ruined. The hotel allowed us to move rooms, but only across the corridor (and we had to pay extra). It overlooked the pool, but there was still the noise from reception. The hotel manager on duty at the time was an unfriendly woman who wouldn’t even come out of her office behind reception to talk to us, just barking orders at her courteous staff who had to relay what she said.

This year, I emailed to ask if I could book a quieter room. I explained I was a returning customer and loved the hotel. They never replied.

It was time for a change.

Enter Le Chateau Lambousa. Recommended to me by a friend. It is situated in Lapta (Lapithos), a few kilometres from Kyrenia. It’s near to what remains of its namesake, Ancient Lambousa. Lambousa was one of the ancient city kingdoms of Cyprus – and a place I spent AGES looking for a couple of years ago.

Le Chateau Lambousa is just to the left of the main coast road in Lapta and is well sign-posted. You can see its turrets peaking over the tops of the trees. Follow the signs and you come to a rather grand entrance.

Don’t be numpties like me and Matt and go in via the back entrance which, confusingly, comes out directly on the main road – just before the proper turn-off. We parked on a bit of wasteland and wheeled all our luggage through the back gates, passing some tired-looking holiday apartments and thinking God! This is going to be awful!

We continued hauling our luggage up a slope and over a bridge.

And then the actual Le Chateau Lambousa came into view through the luscious trees. We passed lawns, a tennis court, a spa centre, a big pool surrounded by comfy swinging seats. People were drinking and chatting on a terrace outside the hotel bar. Room balconies overlooked everything. And the battlements overlooked them. I already loved it!!

We soon realised that we’d come in the wrong entrance when we reached reception and saw a large car park the other side.

I’m not a big fan of sprawling, bland hotel resorts, regardless of how many facilities they have. For me, Le Chateau Lambousa was spot-on. It’s a medium-sized hotel, so big enough to have some life to it but personal as well. And it was quirky too. The walls were lined with rousing paintings of knights on horse-back holding Le Chateau Lambousa banners. I found it amusing – though I’m not sure I was supposed to.

We were shown up to our first-floor room, climbing a stairwell lined with stained-glass windows. It sounds pretentious, doesn’t it? But that really wasn’t the atmosphere. The hotel actually felt very laid-back.

Our room was a small suite with a bathroom, lounge and double bedroom. Goobie slept on a put-up bed in the lounge. There was a small mini-bar and tea-making facilities. Plus LOADS of wardrobes! We didn’t even use them all, though Goobie liked playing hide-and-seek in them. A big balcony ran the length of the suite, accessible via the lounge and the bedroom. My only slight niggle was the whiff of sewage in the bathroom and the lack of bedside lamps. I like to read before I fall asleep and didn’t want to get out of bed to switch off the main light. Aside from that, the rooms were great. And for around €80 a night (depending on the exchange rate), I felt we’d bagged ourselves a bargain.

The hotel provides a varied buffet-style breakfast in a massive underground conference hall. I could imagine it being the perfect wedding venue. The waiters were very attentive and friendly – and great with Herc and Goobie too. And nobody seemed to mind when Goobie got up on stage to perform the Floss dance . . .

We spent an entire morning by the pool. Very unlike us but the atmosphere was so chilled-out and peaceful – and those swinging chairs were so comfy! Herc had his first dip in a pool and then took his daily nap on a swinging chair for two hours!

I joined Herc on the swing and drank Pimms, watching Matt and Goobie have fun in the pool. The hotel grounds were full of beautiful trees and colourful flowers, with the dramatic back-drop of the Kyrenia mountains behind. Wonderful.

On Saturday mornings, there’s the Lambousa market, held just the other side of the hotel car park. We spent a happy hour looking round stalls selling gifts, clothes and – to my HUGE excitement – books in English!!! How I miss browsing bookshops. In the centre of the market was, bizarrely, a wooden Trojan horse for children (and mummies) to climb in.

For evening meals, there are nearby restaurants in Lapta and along the coast road leading to Kyrenia. But we so enjoyed being at the hotel that we uncharacteristically decided to eat in. We went to the hotel’s English-style North Shield bar for a pre-dinner drink and a game of Monopoly. Goobie wiped the floor with us – thank god. He’s a bad loser and we wanted to enjoy our meal.

We had dinner at the hotel both nights, held in a dining hall attached to the bar. It’s an eat-all-you-want buffet and the food was delicious! The hall was practically empty – which was a good thing seeing as Herc was kicking off and Matt was spilling his drinks left, right and centre.

I particularly loved the hotel after sunset; the lights reflecting off the pool, the lattice-shaped shadows of the palm trees across the terrace, the hum of people talking at the tables outside. We spent our evenings on our balcony, reading, talking, drinking wine. And thinking about how lucky we were to have found such a great place to stay. We will definitely go back.