A VERY big day indeed!

Today, we decided to go to the far west end of the Island to Paphos to see several historical places.  This is what started my morning…good morning Cyprus!:

Beautiful!  After taking another cold shower (more on this later)…and not feeling so hot, we got some breakfast made for the group, cleaned up and headed out.  First stop was Petra tou Romiou…or Aphrodite’s birthplace.  It has a lot of meaning to the Cypriots and is considered a holy place for the Goddess of Love.  Here is a beautiful view of the area:

A wide view of the area in the background:

Me and my boy!:

 

Awwww!  Look at the gorgeous blue Mediterranean!  It’s warm too.  That is Aphrodite’s Rock just behind us on the right side of the picture.  We spent a while exploring this area and Brittany even put her feet in the water.

 

As you wander around, you can see all of the lovers who created hearts out of rocks all along the sand and hillsides.  I thought that might be fun to do…but first, Alex decided to take his shoes off and join Brittany in the water:

 

As they were standing on this sacred ground, Alex decided this was the place to ask a very important question:

‘Will you marry me?’  Brittany was completely shocked!

Then the tears started flowing!

And of course, she said yes!

Her gorgeous ring….thanks to the stealthy ways of my Dad and his connections:

It’s just beautiful!  And of course, fits perfectly.  Alex got a phone card especially for Brittany to have the ability to call her parents right after (even if it was like 2am back home!)…they already knew the call was coming because Alex asked permission prior.  Awww!

 

Then, we created our hearts in the sand…

 

Once all of this excitement was done, we headed through this awesome tunnel that runs under the highway to our car:

 

So, Alex feels better after MONTHS of planning and we felt better knowing it was finally done.  We headed into Paphos to explore the city a little more.  First we found a restaurant located right on the water that had fish.  Thea Connie wanted fresh fish…and boy was it good!

 

The fish was caught that morning!  Can’t get any fresher than that.  We spent a long time there enjoying our meal.

 

Look at my cutie, newly engaged kids!  Next up…Paphos, part 2…