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Just returned from three weeks in Cyprus, and overall a wonderful experience. Very laid back attitude to most things, especially driving. The police all seemed to be on holiday; we saw maybe three police cars the whole time we were there and heard not a single siren. The few cops we saw seemed to do little more than direct traffic and carried no guns, truncheons or even handcuffs, but then Cyprus has an incredibly low crime rate.
Other than the "beep hello/beep goodbye", no one ever seems to use the horn (or mirrors or indicators, come to that.) Hire cars have registrations prefixed with Z and black on red plates, which is a mixed blessing - it is every male Cypriot's honour bound duty to overtake every single other car on the road, and black and red plates are a red rag to a bull. Half the tourists we saw seemed to be in convertibles, and I've never seen so many 6 door Mercedes taxis before.
Hire companies specify no driving across the border, but unofficially you can buy a separate policy at a crossing point, to drive in the occupied zone - not an option we really considered, although we'd heard the north is largely unexplored and with far less tourist trade (understandably).
Driving on the left again after 20 years living in Spain was strange at first, but very familiar from when I lived in the UK, with the same models of traffic lights, pelican crossings, road signs, etc. Traffic light junctions nearly all have separate filter lanes for left turners, which eases progress, but the filter lane you then drive into ends abruptly with no warning (e.g. signs or arrows), which gave me a couple of hairy moments. Like Greek drivers, Cypriots rarely stop at the stop line, but creep over, almost blocking the junction and then set off just before a green.
Highlight of three weeks' driving was coming across an immaculate Wolseley 8, parked in the shade with both metal sunroof and hinged windscreen open wide.
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