Driving Directions from Ercan to Kyrenia
March 2, 2010
There is only one airport in Northern Cyprus and that is Ercan Airport. If you rent a car, it will probably be delivered to Ercan airport. Car rental companies will often provide a road map to you.
The reasons for using a car hire vehicle are:
- It is too hot to walk
- There are many places to explore, places that buses cannot take you to
- It saves time for the tourists allowing them to do more site seeing.
- It provides flexibility in planning their activities
The signs are both in Turkish and English and the map is quite easy to follow. However; a little hesitation while driving can still get you lost. So it is best to revise your route before you come here. Here is the easiest route from Ercan to Kyrenia:
- Drive out of the airport, pass the first little round about.
- After 5 minutes you will reach Nicosia/Famagusta junction, take the turn to left towards Nicosia.
- Shortly, you will arrive at the first large round about with a sign, pointing towards right to Kyrenia (Girne in Turkish). DON’T take that turn to right. Go staright towards Nicosia (Lefkosa in Turkish).
- Drive for approximately 15 minutes, passing through several round abouts and traffic lights, until you reach a very very large round about. Just before this round about, you will see a football stadium to your right and an Opel showroom to your left shortly after the stadium.
- On this large round about, turn right towards the mountains and follow that road for about 10-15 minutes until you reach Kyrenia.
Driving Directions Larnaca Airport to North Cyprus
Because Larnaca airport is so accessible from many airports across the UK, Ireland and Europe it’s a popular airport to use for those coming to North Cyprus; as a result many people have contacted us requesting driving directions to take them from Larnaca airport to North Cyprus across the Metehan crossing in Nicosia.
We, like so many others must have written this route out ten times at least and so now, to save us the hassle of ever having to do it again and to save you the hassle of getting lost (hopefully!) here are the ultimate driving directions from Larnaca airport in South Cyprus to Kyrenia (Girne) and Karsiyaka in North Cyprus.
When you hire a car in the South you may be advised that you are not permitted to drive it across the Green Line in Nicosia into Northern Cyprus. This isn’t actually true! What is true is that you cannot take a car hired in the North into the South – but you can take one hired in the South into the North.
The next confusing thing to get past is the mixture of names all for one destination. You have the names Lefkosia, Lefkosa and Nicosia for the capital of Cyprus and you have Girne, Kyrenia and Keryneia for the main harbour and tourist town in North Cyprus…bear this in mind as you will see all used in your journey from South to North.
Okay, so you’ve landed, got your car and you’re ready to go…check the fuel gauge and if you’ve arrived in the early morning or late evening/night make sure you avail yourself of the first petrol station you find that’s open as you have a 100km drive or so to the North (depending on your final destination).
As you leave the airport reset your car’s distance gauge…as you leave the airport you come to a roundabout that directs you to take either left or right to Lefkosia – this is just to get you in the mood for the drive and confuse you from the outset!!! Take the first exit (left) to Lefkosia…the signpost reads ‘Lefkosia 59km’.
Proceed and you will see salt flats on either side of the road which have flamingos on them in the spring.
You come to a small roundabout, go straight on signposted ‘Lefkosia‘. You come to a large roundabout with an overpass above it, go three quarters of the way round this one and take the route marked ‘Lefkosia 56km’ this is the A3…you are on a dual carriageway.
Stay on this road and you will see signposts to both Lefkosia and Nicosia pointing straight on…just whatever you do DON’T go to Lemesos!!!
After you’ve gone about 12km from the airport the road forks and you take the left hand fork signposted ‘Larnaka’ and ‘Lefkosia A2’.
You quickly approach a roundabout and before you get onto it you take the filter lane left to ‘Lefkosia’.
You are on dual carriageway, proceed straight ahead on the A2 to Lefkosia and after you’ve gone a good few kilometres from the airport you suddenly merge onto the A1…just keep following the signs to ‘Nicosia’ or ‘Lefkosia’ (remember, they are the same place!).
After you’re about 44km away from the airport you will spot a huge football stadium on your left and start to see signs for the ‘General Hospital’, ‘Troodos’ and ‘Strovolos’ as well as a small sign for ‘Kioneli’ and ‘Keryneia’ and the road numbers ‘B22’ and ‘A9’, this is junction 3, it is straight after the football stadium on your left and this is the junction you need to take!
You then come to a large roundabout which has coloured balls on it (!!) – take the filter lane left which says Keryneia is 38km, it also is signposted ‘Strovolos and Troodos’. You are in a fairly industrial part of Lefkosia now. Proceed straight on, at the first set of traffic lights you’ll see a large shopping centre on your left where there are toilets, a Macdonalds, cash point etc., in case you need a break…otherwise go straight on at the traffic lights in the direction of ‘Lakatameia and Troodos’. Go straight on at the next lights which are on the brow of a hill and proceed to the next roundabout where you go straight on in the direction of ‘Troodos and Lakatameia’.
Go straight on again at the next roundabout where you have a big Metro on your left. Straight on is signposted as ‘Keryneia and Troodos’. You may also notice some white road signs directing you forward to the ‘Makareio Stadium’.
You proceed up a hill to the next roundabout and go straight on again signposted ‘Makedonitissa and Keryneia’. Go down the hill and straight on across a couple of sets of small lights until you come back up hill to a T junction with a large Greek church on your right.
Go right signposted ‘Kioneli 12km’ and ‘Keryneia 31km’.
Proceed forward through a number of sets of small traffic lights (pedestrian crossings mainly) until you come to a roundabout with large yellow hoops on it. You will have gone about 57km from the airport by now. At this roundabout go straight on again and then start looking out for the Coca Cola factory on your right. Just after it there is a set of traffic lights and you need to go left at the traffic lights. There is a sign saying ‘Kioneli 8km’ and ‘Keryneia 12km’ but it’s confusingly posted on the right hand side of the road and not easy to spot!
Proceed forward over the next set of traffic lights where there is a shop called ‘4 Seasons’ on your left. You will now be approaching the border…slow right down.
Ahead of you you should notice the road bends to the right, there is a slip road to the left marked off with bollards and if you look up you will see Greek, South Cyrus, EU, North Cyprus and Turkish flags flying…this is the border. So, do NOT go round the corner to the right, take the left slip road and proceed to the portacabins ahead of you and stop.
You will need your passports, car documents, driving license and some money (Cyprus pounds, English pounds or Turkish lira are accepted). Go to the insurance office and get car insurance for the duration of your stay (it’s not expensive but changes often so I won’t publish a price as it’ll be out of date by next week!), then go to the passport office, fill in the white slips of paper they have there which are visas and which require your name, passport number and nationality.
Present the visa, passport and car insurance papers to the passport controller and then when you have your stamp (they stamp the white bit of paper not your passport) you can leave the border and drive straight on into North Cyprus.
Proceed ahead to a roundabout with traffic lights, go straight on to Girne…at next roundabout take the first left signposted ‘Girne, Kyrenia, Gonyali, Guzelyurt’ etc., etc!
Watch out for lots of speed bumps on this road!
You’ll soon come to a roundabout with traffic lights and depending on which way you want to go, the directions change at this point: -
Going to Girne – get in the right hand lane and go three quarters of the way round this roundabout. Proceed straight ahead until you come to a huge roundabout where you take the first left signposted ‘Girne’.
Stay on this dual carriage way all the way through the plains and over the mountains and down into Kyrenia or Girne. You will then arrive at a roundabout known locally as the Lefkosa roundabout and you can take the first left for Karaoglanoglu, Alsancak and Lapta, you can go straight ahead for Girne centre or you can go three quarters of the way round for Karakum, Bellapais, Ozankoy, Catalkoy or Esentepe.
Going to Famagusta – get in the right hand lane and go three quarters of the way round this roundabout. Proceed straight ahead until you come to a huge roundabout where you go straight on towards the stadium and follow the signs to ‘Gazi Magusa’ or ‘Famagusta’…it will take you about three quarters of an hour to an hour to get there from this roundabout…on the way you also pass signs to Ercan airport.
Going to Karsiyaka – get in the left lane and you don’t have to wait for the lights to change, just check and if the road to the right of you is clear of oncoming traffic go left at this roundabout signposted ‘Morphou, Guzelyurt’ etc., you will be on dual carriageway driving away from the city and gradually it will become less built up.
Go straight on at the next roundabout you come to signposted ‘Guzelyurt’ and you’ll be going past a large BMW dealership on your left. After you’ve gone about 73km away from the airport the road becomes single lane (although at the time of writing they are building a wider road!). 3 – 4 km later be aware you are going to have to make a right hand turn across the traffic.
You will see a signpost that has an arrow going left to ‘Guzelyurt’ and an arrow going straight ahead to ‘Yilmazkoy and Girne’ – this is inaccurate. In reality the road carries on to Guzelyurt and exactly on a corner with an Alpet petrol station on your right you have to go right and turn across oncoming traffic so be careful.
Girne is signposted here as being 40km away. Go straight on on this single track road through various small villages such as Yilmazkoy, Kilicaslan and Ozhan (about 85km away from the airport) and you’ll be driving through countryside mainly. You will see the odd sign to Girne and after you’re about 91km from the airport you start going down a very steep hill usually littered with construction trucks going slowly. Take care on this hill.
At the bottom of the hill is Gecitkoy village and a little further on and you’ll see the sea…keep going for a few more kilometres, up a small hill and in a little while you’ll see a village square on your left and a turning to your right marked Karsiyaka! Take this right hand road for Karsiyaka village or stay straight on and you’ll go through Lapta, Alsancak, Karaoglanoglu and eventually reach Girne via a different route!