A derelict hotel on a mountain. A history full of opulence and royalty. A place that breeds ghost stories.

The Berengaria Hotel. One of Cyprus’s top unofficial tourist destinations. And a place I am obsessed with.

I have been obsessed with the Berengaria since I first stumbled across it 18 months ago. My parents were over for a two-week stay and we were driving to Kykkos Monastery. Our journey had taken us through Platres and we were heading for Trooditissa and Prodromos. Just after passing the Trooditissa Monastery, I spotted this incredible building, looming imposingly over Prodromos village.

‘What the heck is that?!’ I said to my parents.

My guess was that it was a prison or a hospital. But one thing was certain – we had to explore it.

We got to the roundabout at Prodromos and lost sight of it. All the roundabout exits led to signposted villages – except one. This exit disappeared into the trees.

We followed the exit into the trees and the tarmac road turned into dirt track that led upwards. I didn’t have the Land Rover back then and the Toyota couldn’t go any further. So we parked and continued on foot. Beneath our feet we saw a well-trampled fence. A sign appeared telling us to go no further – that what lay ahead was dangerous.

Red rag to a bull.

Even from here the atmosphere was spooky. The trees were gnarled and spiky and there was mist in the air (unlike the photo above, which was taken on a different day).  To say I have an overactive imagination is the understatement of the century. I’ve spent too many years reading too many books. As a wall of dark crumbling brick loomed up in front of me, I got that exhilarating trembly feeling in my legs. This was scary.

The side of the massive building was in full view now. Glassless windows looked down on us, choked with vines. And I just knew we were being watched. By who, I didn’t know. But obviously by something scaaarrrrryyyy.

To the left was the ruined site of an old tennis court. We continued up and followed the path left to the front of the building. A terrifying face grinned at us from the side of the wall. Just some very well-drawn graffiti. But, god, it heightened the spooky atmosphere.

It appeared we had arrived at the main entrance of this mysterious building. We peered inside and saw a flight of stairs in the middle of an entrance hall that branched out in opposite directions on the floor above.

We continued around the outside of the hotel, looking in windows. I was still convinced that this was a prison or hospital. But Goobie was with us and I was reluctant to go inside in case something fell on us. Nonetheless, we made a quick dash through a door, across a grey ground floor room and into a central outside area at the back.

From the back we could see that this massive building was c-shaped, and nestled between the outer wings of the building were two swimming pools filled with detritus and dirty rain water. A rotting diving board cast its shadow over the end of the adult pool. At this point I ruled out this place as a prison and began to wonder whether it was a hotel.

We followed some narrow steps down a slope at the far side of the pool and found a row of changing rooms and toilets. We continued round, back to the main building and looked in doorways that led to the basement level.  We didn’t go in, fearful for Goobie’s safety.

I didn’t take many photos of our visit that day. Which is very out of character. But I was so in awe of the building, so freaked out by it spookiness. It was an overcast day, much of the building was in shade and it was utterly terrifying. But utterly fascinating too. We left and continued on our journey to Kykkos Monastery. We had one of my favourite days in Cyprus. Kykkos Monastery was magnificent. But we all agreed that the highlight of the day had been our visit to this mysterious derelict building.

When I got home, I did a Google search and quickly had a name for the building – the Berengaria Hotel. I read all I could find about its history. Named after Queen Berengaria, who married King Richard the Lionheart in Limassol Castle, the Berengaria Hotel was built and opened by Mr Kokkalos in 1931, the first luxury hotel of its kind. It attracted people from all over the world, including the likes of Winston Churchill, King Farouk of Egypt, the Duke of Marlborough and the President of Israel. It had state-of-the-art facilities, a casino and a nightclub.

It closed in 1984 after it began losing money. It has stood empty for over 30 years, though even in the 1990s some of the original furniture remained, there were still clothes in the wardrobes and hotel postcards on the floor.

Unsurprisingly, numerous ghost stories surround the hotel. Legend has it that Mr Kokkalos had three sons who he gave an equal share of the property to. They were vain and greedy and there was a feud about hotel profits. Money wasn’t invested in the hotel and it ultimately failed. Apparently all three sons died in mysterious circumstances.

There’s also the story of the hotel manager who killed himself and apparently still haunts the hotel, wandering its dark corridors. There’s the woman who was found dead in the swimming pool and is now seeking revenge. A black-haired lady is seen leaning against a window at dusk. Screams and cries are heard coming from the hotel at night. The internet is full of ghost stories. According to the hotel’s current owner Michalis Ioannides, 100-200 people visit the hotel every weekend, drawn by its mysterious past.

Ever since that first unexpected visit in 2015, I had wanted to return to the Berengaria Hotel. I wanted to explore inside. But I couldn’t take Goobie with me. I needed to go when he was at school – and I needed to go with people who were gutsy enough to come inside with me.

17 months later, my aunt and uncle, Angela and Tony, visited Cyprus for a holiday. I’d told them about the Berengaria Hotel before and they were keen to visit. So one Thursday while Goobie was at school, I finally returned to the place that I’d obsessed about for over a year.

We went on a sunny day, a totally clear blue sky above us. We walked up the dirt track towards the hotel. And there it stood, its walls towering over us, the witch still grinning at us. The day was so beautiful and the views from the hotel so impressive that it didn’t seem quite as spooky as before. This was good – I’d hopefully have the guts to go inside.

Angela and Tony were the perfect people to explore the hotel with. We laughed and joked as we took our first step inside. At first it wasn’t so spooky. Sunlight streamed through the windows, illuminating the dusty interior. As we walked along the ground floor I tried to imagine the lounges and dining rooms that once occupied this gutted shell.

We reached the far wing. There wasn’t as much sunlight on this side and I struggled to control my wayward imagination. A large fireplace dominated one wall, the stones around it blackened. It was a far cry from the comfortable lounge it used to heat in bygone days.

I willed myself on, determined to explore every single nook and cranny, the darkened rooms, the store cupboards hidden in the shadows.  The graffiti didn’t help. ‘Away’ it proclaimed. ‘Run’. A huge skull glared at me from across a room. My mind kept turning to The Blair Witch Project and my heart was hammering like the clappers. Thank god for the sun and for my aunt and uncle. If we’d visited on an overcast day like in 2015, I’m not sure I would have been very brave. How people have the guts to visit at night I don’t know.

We found a small crumbling staircase at the back of the hotel, leading upwards. It was too dangerous to climb these stairs so we returned to the entrance hall and tentatively walked up the main staircase, worried that it could collapse at any moment.

Two wings spread out on either side of the entrance hall, both vast and totally gutted. I tried to imagine the bedrooms that would have lined these caverns, but there was little to help apart from the endless windows and the regular insets in the wall that perhaps marked where one room began and the other ended. If so, the bedrooms wouldn’t have been very big.

We weren’t able to walk the full length of either wing. At the end of the right wing, the floor had caved in. The left wing was in a worse state; the entire side of the building was falling down.

We returned to the entrance hall and peeked up the main staircase leading to the second floor. You had to walk across a small balcony to get to it – and there were cracks across the balcony floor. I knew it was dangerous, but I couldn’t go home until I’d explored the entire building. Before I had time to talk myself out of it, I hopped across the balcony and jumped onto the staircase, which thankfully was in better condition.  I walked up on my own – totally freaked out to be on the second floor by myself. But, once again, thank god for the sunlight. The second floor matched the one beneath; two vast, gutted wings. The top floor, though, had a massive pointed iron roof over it. Apparently it was installed recently when there had been plans to renovate the hotel. It was quite beautiful, actually. But I didn’t stay long enough to allow my imagination time to wonder what the shadows were in the corners at the far end.

We went outside to the pool area. It didn’t look as spooky with the sunshine reflecting off the murky water. I wondered whether a woman really had been found dead in it.

We walked down to the changing rooms and peered into a long dark corridor.  We couldn’t see the end and didn’t have a torch on us so we didn’t go in. Back home, I played around with lightening the photo to see what was in the corridor. And I totally freaked myself out!! Is it just me, or does that look like a big pumpkin face person peering out from the far right hand side of the corridor??? Just beneath the bit where the light comes in. Stand back a bit and look at it.

We stepped into the basements. Sunlight poured through rotten floorboards above. We found ourselves in a room painted dark blue and I suddenly realised – this was the nightclub! We could still see patterns and illustrations on the walls. The blue painted walls was one of the few things left of the hotel as it had originally been.

We’d explored the entire building and were heading back to the car when I spotted a little footpath leading downwards around the back of the hotel. I called out to my aunt and uncle that I was just popping down there for a quick look. As I ran down the path, the hotel walls blocked the sun and I was in shadow. Immediately the cheery atmosphere transformed to something more foreboding. It felt like the hotel had lulled me into a false sense of security with its bright sunlit rooms and was reminding me that it had a very different, menacing side – a side we’d experienced during our first visit. I instantly regretted coming on my own, but I wasn’t turning back until I’d explored ALL of the hotel, stubborn arse that I am.

Down the path were a row of garages built beneath the changing rooms. I looked inside one and the floor fell away and there was just a black chasm in front of me. What was down there, I have no idea. I had no torch. At this point, my nerve gave and I legged it back up the path to my aunt and uncle and the Land Rover.

I feel I need to add a disclaimer here. Take heed of the sign at the entrance of the Berengaria warning about how dangerous it is. This is totally correct. I chose to ignore this warning, putting myself at risk. This post is in no way trying to encourage people to do the same. I would encourage you not to go inside. There are major MAJOR structural weaknesses in there and the floorboards are rotting. These photos illustrate the extent of the damage:

So, I’d finally explored the Berengaria Hotel. It was a brilliant day. But did my obsession with it end there? Of course not. A few weeks later, Matt, Goobie and I checked into the Forest Park Hotel for a Christmas holiday. I knew that part of the reason for staying at the Forest Park Hotel was to feel closer to the Berengaria. The Forest Park Hotel also opened in the 1930s, also hosted royalty. They would have been competitors. Would the Forest Park Hotel provide clues to what the Berengaria was like in its day? I hoped so.

I met the lovely Herakles Skyriannides, current owner of the Forest Park Hotel and son of its founder. I asked him about the Berengaria. Did he remember it? What was it like?  Why did it fail when the Forest Park Hotel thrives to this day? He told me that the Berengaria was a victim of poor business decisions. As the hotel industry in Cyprus expanded and developed, the Berengaria didn’t keep up. Its rooms were state-of-the-art in the 1930s, but in the decades that followed, guests expected en-suite rooms. While the Forest Park Hotel closed for renovation a number of times in its 80-year history (to add en-suite facilities etc.), the Berengaria didn’t. Its guests still had to use the toilet block at the end of each wing. And so it started to lose customers.

There were other poor decisions too. In the 1960s, Mr Skyriannides installed the first swimming pool in Cyprus in the Forest Park Hotel. He told me that he had advised the owner of the Berengaria to also install a swimming pool, ideally where the tennis courts were on the edge of the hill that the hotel stands on. Instead, the Berengaria installed the pool in the middle of the c-shaped area of the hotel on the other side. Because of its location, not enough sun reached the swimming pool and it was often cold to swim in. This put customers off.

Another bone of contention was the nightclub. Mr Skyriannides had considered building a nightclub in the Forest Park Hotel but couldn’t see a way to contain the noise and maintain a peaceful atmosphere for the guests. Despite the Berengaria’s nightclub being in the basement, the noise travelled, putting off many guests.

Gradually the guests stopped coming, the profits plummeted and the hotel closed. Such a shame.

And what about the future of the Berengaria? I’d heard there were plans to renovate it and turn it into a spa and casino. I hope it is brought back to life, but having seen the extent of the structural damage, I wonder how this will be possible.

For now, its crumbling skeleton remains, watching over Prodromos – an echo from an earlier age of opulence, celebrity and glamour.

The Berengaria is the ultimate ghost hotel.