Wine Festival on Cyprus
A wine festival showcasing products from the vineyards of Cyprus will be held August 27 through September 5, 2010, in the town of Lemesos (Limassol). The Festival takes place in the Municipal Gardens, on the east side of the town near the sea. The first wine festival was held in 1961.
Although there’s an admission fee for the festival, once you’re in, Road Trips Foodies, tasting is complementary. There are pavilions on both sides of the main entrance belonging to the wineries of Lemesos (Limassol): ETKO, KEO, LOEL, SODAP, and LAONA. As the organizers say, “all the wines [are] offered to all visitors in unlimited quantities free of charge with the compliments of the Lemesos (Limassol) Municipality”.
Winemaking is an ancient art on the island, dating back to Classical Greece. In medieval times this island, the third largest in the Mediterranean Sea, was renowned for its wine (a 16th century traveler from Italy noted that “it possesses some healing qualities like a balm for the human organism”). The Wine Festival is a revival of ancient festivals in honor of Dionysus, the god of vine and wine, and Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty and love.
Lemesos (Limassol) is one of the six districts of Cyprus, the second in population after the capital Nicosia. It’s on the southwest of Nicosia, on the south coast of Cyprus.