Geroskipou

Geroskipou has made loukoumi, the gel-and-nut confection sold across the eastern Mediterranean under various names, since the 1890s, and several family workshops still boil, set and cut it on the premises with the process visible from the shop. The town also has the church of Agia Paraskevi, a rare five-domed Byzantine building of the ninth century with wall paintings inside, and a folk art museum in an Ottoman-era house.

History

The name joins the Greek words for holy and garden, and tradition places the sacred gardens of Aphrodite here; pilgrims from Nea Paphos passed through on their way to her temple at Kouklia, and Strabo calls the place Hierokepia. Travellers wrote of centuries-old olive and carob trees on the plain, the five-domed Byzantine church of Agia Paraskevi rose in the middle of what is now the town, and at Moulia on the coast the monk Ignatios is said to have found the icon of the Panagia Chrysorrogiatissa. In 1811 Sir Sidney Smith made Andreas Zimboulakis, born in Kefalonia, British vice-consul here; his house, where many visitors were received, was bought in 1947 by the Department of Antiquities and became the Folk Art Museum. In 1925 a British company opened a silk factory that employed hundreds of people from Geroskipou and nearby villages until 1952, and there was a linen mill too (Wikipedia, Geroskipou).

What to look for

• The loukoumi workshops - family producers boiling, setting and cutting on site.
• Agia Paraskevi - a five-domed ninth-century church with wall paintings.
• The folk art museum - tools, textiles and domestic objects in an old house.
• The main square - the working centre of a town rather than a resort.

When to go

Year round; the church and shops keep normal hours. Workshops are most interesting on weekday mornings when production is running. Summer afternoons are hot and quiet.

Good to know

The town is ordinary outside these few points and there is no old quarter to wander. The church closes for a long midday break. Loukoumi is sold everywhere on the island, so the appeal is watching it made.

Nearby

Paphos is three kilometres west, and the Sanctuary of Aphrodite is east along the coast.

Key facts