Bellapais Abbey: tickets, opening hours and the village above Kyrenia

Bellapais Abbey is a 13th-century Gothic monastery ruin in the hills 6 km above Kyrenia in northern Cyprus. In the 2026 summer season it opens daily from 08:00 to 19:00 (last entry 18:00) until 31 October, and a full ticket costs 150 Turkish lira, about £2.30. That price is three times what it was last year, so ignore any guide that still says 50 lira.

The Turkish Cypriot antiquities department calls it the finest example of Gothic art in the Near East, and it is one of the most photographed ruins on the island, thanks to its cloister arches and the long view down to the sea. It is also in the north, under Turkish Cypriot administration, so getting there from a holiday in Paphos, Limassol or Ayia Napa means crossing the Green Line. This guide covers the official prices and hours, the drive from where you are likely to be staying, what to look for inside and the village around it.

Bellapais Abbey at a glance

Where	Bellapais (Beylerbeyi) village, Kyrenia district, northern Cyprus
Altitude	About 220 m, above Kyrenia and the coast
Hours, 1 Apr to 31 Oct 2026	08:00 to 19:00, last entry 18:00
Hours, last winter (1 Nov 2025 to 31 Mar 2026)	08:00 to 17:00, last entry 16:00
Ticket, summer 2026	150 TL full, 50 TL student
Ticket, last winter	50 TL full, 20 TL student
Run by	Department of Antiquities and Museums (Eski Eserler ve Müzeler Dairesi)
Currency	Turkish lira
Time to allow	About an hour, more with the village

Tickets and opening hours in 2026

The figures above come from the visiting-hours page of the Turkish Cypriot Department of Antiquities and Museums, which runs the site. Archived copies of that page show the full ticket at 50 lira throughout the 2025 summer and the 2025 to 2026 winter, rising to 150 lira when the summer schedule started on 1 April 2026. The student ticket went from 20 to 50 lira. Hours did not change.

In practice the rise is small for a UK visitor. At the European Central Bank reference rate on 5 October 2026, 150 lira is about £2.30 or €2.70. The lira moves quickly, so check the rate before you go; our guide to money in Cyprus explains why the north uses a different currency from the south.

Two timing points are worth knowing this month:

• The summer schedule ends on 31 October. From 1 November the abbey has previously closed at 17:00 with last entry at 16:00. The winter 2026 to 2027 hours and price had not been posted when we checked, so confirm them on the official page.
• The clocks go back on 25 October. By our calculation sunset at Bellapais falls at 18:24 on 5 October, 18:00 on 24 October and 16:59 on 25 October. For the last week of the summer season the gate stays open for two hours after dark, so if you want the view over Kyrenia in daylight, arrive by mid-afternoon.

Sundays are free for citizens of the north only; everyone else pays the standard price. The same department runs Kyrenia Castle at the same hours and price, and St Hilarion Castle from 09:00 to 18:30 (last entry 17:30), also at 150 lira.

What to see inside

The site is compact and easy to read. The Department of Antiquities’ own description and Wikipedia’s Bellapais Abbey article agree on the main parts.

The gate and forecourt. You enter through a fortified gateway on the south side, which replaced an earlier drawbridge, into a garden forecourt with orange trees (the view in our photo).

The church. Dating from the 13th century, it is the best-preserved part of the abbey, with a flat roof and an open belfry above the entrance that still holds one bell. Inside are a carved pulpit and a bishop’s throne. The frescoes on its front were added in the 15th century.

The cloister. The heart of the abbey is a square cloister ringed by 18 arches, many with the delicate stone tracery that appears in most photographs of Bellapais. On the north side, two Roman sarcophagi stand one above the other. The canons used them as a washbasin: water ran from the decorated upper one into the plain one below.

The refectory. Behind the sarcophagi, a door carved with the coats of arms of Cyprus, Jerusalem and the Lusignan kings opens into the dining hall, about 30 m by 10 m. Six tall windows face the sea and a rose window lights the east wall. A pulpit still projects from the north wall, where a canon read aloud during meals. The department calls the room a flawless example of Gothic work. Look for bullet holes in the east wall, left by British soldiers who used the hall as a hospital after 1878.

The chapter house. On the east side, look up at the carved figures: a man carrying a ladder, a man between two sirens, a woman reading, and a monkey and a cat in a pear tree above a man with a shield.

A short history

The first canons arrived after Saladin took Jerusalem in 1187. They had been custodians of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and King Aimery de Lusignan founded the abbey for them, with the first buildings going up between 1198 and 1205. The church and most of what survives were built under King Hugh III (1267 to 1284); the cloister and refectory followed under Hugh IV (1324 to 1359), who kept apartments in the abbey.

The name is usually explained as a corruption of the French Abbaye de la Paix, the Abbey of Peace, though the historian George Hill was not convinced. Genoese raiders stripped the abbey in 1373. After the Ottoman conquest in 1571 it was given to the Greek Orthodox Church and the church became the village parish, while the rest decayed. British authorities began repairs in 1912. Since 1974 the village has been in the north, and its Greek Cypriot residents left; the village’s Turkish name is Beylerbeyi.

Getting there

From Kyrenia it is a short drive or taxi ride up the hill. From the south, you cross the Green Line first. Our Green Line crossing guide covers documents, which crossings take cars and what you can bring back.

These driving times come from the OSRM routing engine on the public road network, ending at the abbey. They do not include time at a checkpoint.

Starting point	Distance	Drive time (no queue)
Kyrenia harbour	6.1 km	10 min
Ayios Dometios crossing, Nicosia	29.0 km	36 min
Larnaca Airport	84.1 km	1 hr 26 min
Limassol	115.6 km	1 hr 51 min
Paphos Airport	172.9 km	2 hr 34 min

The Ledra Palace crossing in Nicosia is for pedestrians, so if you walk across from our Nicosia old town walk, you will need a taxi on the other side.

By hire car. The UK Foreign Office warns that cars hired in the Republic often have no insurance cover in the north. Buying insurance at the crossing does not mean the rental company allows the trip, so check the contract first; our car hire guide explains what to look for.

On a tour. Day tours from the south usually pair Bellapais with Kyrenia harbour and sometimes St Hilarion, and handle the crossing for you. That is the simplest option from Paphos or Limassol.

Your phone. North of the line your handset may join a Turkish network, where EU roaming caps do not apply. Our phone guide explains how to avoid a surprise bill.

The village and Lawrence Durrell

Bellapais village climbs the hillside behind the abbey. Lawrence Durrell bought a house here in the 1950s and wrote about it in Bitter Lemons, his account of 1953 to 1956 in Cyprus, which won the Duff Cooper Prize. His house, up a steep lane, carries a plaque. He wrote about idling over coffee under the “Tree of Idleness”, and because the book never pinned the tree down precisely, two cafés by the abbey now claim it. Neither claim can be settled, which is part of the fun.

Each spring the abbey refectory hosts the Bellapais International Music Festival, with evening concerts. The 2025 festival, its 27th, ran from 16 May to 20 June with concerts starting at 20:30. Check the 2027 programme nearer the time if you are planning a spring trip.

Is it worth the trip?

If you are staying in Kyrenia, yes, without question: it is ten minutes away and the finest Gothic building on the island for the price of a coffee. From Nicosia or Larnaca it makes a good day out combined with Kyrenia harbour. From Paphos it is a long day for an hour at the abbey, and our north or south Cyprus guide may help you decide whether a night in the north would suit you better.

If you enjoy Crusader-era stonework, the south has its own: Kolossi Castle near Limassol is a Knights Hospitaller tower rebuilt in 1454, while the same Lusignan dynasty still ruled Cyprus. And if you are heading north anyway, Varosha, the fenced resort quarter of Famagusta, is on the east coast.

Sources for changing details: Hours, ticket prices and the building description from the Turkish Cypriot Department of Antiquities and Museums, checked 5 October 2026, with earlier prices from Internet Archive copies of its visiting-hours page dated July 2025, December 2025 and April 2026; history from Wikipedia’s Bellapais Abbey and Bellapais articles; exchange rate from the European Central Bank reference rate on 5 October 2026; hire-car advice from the UK Foreign Office; 2025 festival dates from Cyprus FAQ. Confirm hours locally before you travel.

Hero photo: Bellapais Abbey church and forecourt, June 2012, by Vadim Indeikin, via Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. Cropped.