Ayia Napa: not quite so crazy now

It’s looking like another mixed – but mostly acceptable – year for Ayia Napa, and another step in its gradual transformation.

Clubbing-wise, the resort’s heyday was a crazy few years at the dawn of the 00s, when it became a hub of the UK garage scene and DJs would flit back and forth between Napa and Ibiza. These days, however, clubbing is only a part of it.

There’s a clear divide between the family-friendly beach road and the more chaotic, more derelict ‘Bar Street’ – with public toilets, for instance, having been installed at the former but not the latter, one of several issues mentioned by locals. Even the bar and club scene, though, isn’t quite what it was.

Young people have changed, one bar owner told the Cyprus Mail.

“They care about their social-media photos, how they look on social media”. They used to stay in town for one or two weeks – but now “it’s trendy to be in different places, for their social-media photos. They might be here for four days, then they go four days to another destination”.

Even during that time, they might only venture out once or twice – partly because their days are now filled with organised pool parties, booze cruises and late-afternoon sunset parties, so they’re less likely to go out at night. “Not like before. Before, everybody used to go out every night.”

Then again, the tourist mix is changing – which is the result of a concerted, long-term effort to weed out the rowdy drunken element.

“The quality of people [we’re getting] is different this year,” Ayia Napa mayor Christos Zanettou told the Cyprus Mail.

There are older tourists mixed in with the youngsters, says a bar owner – even families. “The kids are 18, 19, they come with their parents to Napa… But the parents are going out too.” Some are presumably veterans of the old crazy Napa of So Solid Crew, now returning – in a more becalmed way – with their own teenagers.

Even the much-maligned British tourists aren’t so crazy at the moment, says the bar owner, who’s previously worked in places like Tenerife and witnessed the Brits Abroad there.

“In Tenerife the rhythm was like, 10pm everyone was already drunk. At 10.30 you already had people laying on the floor, passed out drunk, and at 11 there was just fights everywhere. So we are very lucky here.”

The business owners we spoke to on Bar Street requested anonymity in order to speak more freely about certain matters – like a comparison of the various nationalities.

The Russians, for instance, were never big nightlife people. Even when they went out, it was almost exclusively to Russian-speaking places. Most of them came from villages, explains a bar owner, so they didn’t have much money and were drawn to Napa’s beaches more than its nightclubs anyway.

That said, hotels and restaurants have suffered due to the post-war loss of the Russian market – just as the British market took a hit this year due to the Iran-Israel war. At one point, TUI Airways was offering one-way tickets at £26.

“With Cyprus being where it is [geographically], we’ll always suffer,” Pambos Alexandrou, president of the association of owners of hospitality venues in the Famagusta region, told the Cyprus Mail.

The absent Russians have partly been replaced by Poles, Serbs and Romanians. When it comes to nationalities, however, the most annoying tourists to have as customers (at least in Ayia Napa) “are none other than the Israelis,” according to one bar owner.

“They’re problematic wherever they go,” he claims. Not only are they slow to spend money, they can also be difficult and refuse to take ‘no’ for an answer.  

The owner relates a story of a taxi-driver friend who only has a licence for seven passengers. A party of nine Israelis stopped him at the beach, and absolutely insisted that he take all of them – then, to cap it off, once he finally convinced them to take a second taxi, his passengers “shook their arms like this, so all the sand from the beach would fall in the taxi…

“They have no manners,” he gripes.

The real issues, though, according to members of the association, have to do with migrants rather than tourists. 

“At the start of the season, there was a big problem… There are groups of young Syrians who beat up tourists – and not only tourists – and rob them, or else they come in bars and try to cause trouble.”

Prostitution was never a serious problem in Napa – but now, says one member, “the Africans who’ve come here, they bring women who walk down the street looking for customers. Opposite my shop, in the basement there, there’s about 10 girls who go out. They’ve straightened their hair, they dress provocatively… I throw them out when they come in the shop.”

Zanettou, the mayor, is quick to play down these issues.

The cases of prostitution “have been reported,” he says. “We’ve had police raids, we’ve had arrests. At the moment, [the problem] doesn’t exist,” though there might be some isolated cases.

As for crime in general, there may have been incidents earlier but “for the past two weeks now, Ayia Napa is being guarded by 35-40 police officers.

“Every night there are three patrols by MMAD [the Mobile Immediate Action Unit, brought in from Nicosia], which are about 10 people, plus another 10 from the local police authority, plus from the Crime Prevention Office”. This arrangement will continue till late August, when the season begins to wind down.

That said, there are problems raised on Bar Street which the mayor agrees are real problems.

The issue of kiosks being allowed to sell alcohol is one such problem – a clear case of unfair competition, since the kiosks can open all hours, set up shop next to the bars, and sell booze much cheaper. (The ultimate insult, according to one bar owner, is when customers get drunk from the kiosk next door then come to his bar to use the toilet, since there are no public toilets!) This, however, can only be solved by Parliament amending the relevant legislation, not by the municipality.

Noise pollution is another real problem, as are touts. Generally, though, mayor Zanettou is sanguine.

“Speaking as Ayia Napa, we’re extremely satisfied – in terms of occupancy rates, services, quality of tourism, and the change in the market that we’re attracting right now.”

The first bar owner – the one who talked about Gen Z – is less optimistic, noting that business is slightly down throughout Napa, even if the ‘quality’ of tourists may be higher. “It’s not so tragic yet. But let’s hope it doesn’t continue like this.”

“It’s less than before, but – OK, I can’t complain,” he concludes, looking back on the ups and downs of our most famous beach resort. “I mean, it was always going very well, and now it’s less.

“I have to consider that’s just the way it goes.”