Travel Guide Vokolida - Bafra

This is the only part of the Karpas peninsula that has been turned over to mass tourism. It's a far cry from the little shepherds' village touted by Turkish tourism agencies. This postcard existed before 1974. Vokolida ("shepherdess" in Greek Cypriot dialect) was then populated exclusively by Greek Cypriots (fewer than 400), all of whom were expelled during the 1974 invasion. The village was gradually repopulated by settlers from southern Turkey. And, as the region was then devoted to tobacco production, it was renamed after a Turkish cigarette brand, Bafra, which is also the name of a town on the Black Sea. On the shore, the 3 km of beaches have taken on the air of a "Mediterranean Las Vegas" since the 2000s, with four major resorts: Kaya Artemis (a sort of body-built Ephesus temple), Noah's Ark (a huge concrete Noah's Ark), Limak Babylon (with its so-called hanging gardens) and, the latest addition, the Concorde Resort (more classic but just as huge). There are private beaches, casinos, giant swimming pools, hundreds of apartments for rent or sale..