Wine routes

Route 1: Laona – Akamas

Sea-cooled limestone on the island's north-western shoulder, and the Xynisteri that thrives on it.

The route climbs the E701 and E709 out of Pafos onto the Laona plateau above the Akamas peninsula. It is not a wine-only trip: the peninsula is one of the rarest habitats on the island, and the villages along the way keep as many tavernas as vineyards.

Route 2: Vouni Panagias – Ampelitis

Steep forested slopes east of Pafos, climbing past 1,100m, with the widest grape list of any route.

A mountain road through long-established wine country, where the welcome comes from the whole village rather than just the cellar door. Oak groves and pine forest fill the slopes between the vineyards, and the wildlife list is long.

Route 3: Diarizos Valley

A low, green river valley outside the appellation map — and the Mavro grape's heartland.

East of Pafos three fertile valleys run down from the Troodos.

Route 4: Krasochoria of Lemesos

Twenty wine villages on the southern Troodos — the densest concentration of wineries on the island.

The classic route. Twenty villages spread across the southern face of the mountains, each rewarding a stop for its own reasons: cobbled lanes and traditional architecture as much as the cellar. Two dozen wineries along the way welcome visitors.

Route 5: Commandaria

Fourteen villages, two grapes, and the oldest named wine still in production.

A trip back to 1192, the date the Cyprus Tourism Organisation gives for the origins of the world's first named wine, when Richard the Lionheart sold the island to the Knights Templar. The wine took its name from the estate at Kolossi — La Grande Commanderie, later held by the Knights of St John — and its fame was such that it is said to have won the 13th-century Battle of the Wines, a tasting contest held under the French king Philip Augustus. Fourteen villages ring the slopes above, their vines sharing the ground with scrub and thin woodland.

Route 6: Pitsilia

The highest vineyards in the country, under Olympus, Madari and Papoutsa.

East of the Troodos summit, eleven villages sit beneath three peaks — Olympus at 1,952m, Madari at about 1,600m and Papoutsa at 1,554m. Every reachable slope is planted: almonds, olives, walnuts and apples line the streets, and the vineyards run up to the pine forest behind them.

Route 7: Mountainous Larnaka – Lefkosia

Outside the traditional wine map, and planting Assyrtiko and Maratheftiko anyway.

The seventh and last route runs through the rural uplands of Larnaka and Lefkosia: ten villages and six wineries.