To Cyprus, to Nicosia. This is what travel looked like before 1974.

Today, a three-hour flight from Poland is enough to reach Cyprus. Decades ago, however, the journey itself was part of the holiday adventure. Planes landed in Nicosia, made frequent stopovers, and passengers enjoyed hot meals served on porcelain and could… smoke a cigarette on board.

For modern travelers, flying to Cyprus is completely normal. We buy a ticket online, go through security, and in less than four hours, we disembark in Larnaca or Paphos.

Just a few decades ago, things were completely different. The journey itself was an event, and passenger aviation had an air of elegance and prestige that's hard to find today.

The main gateway to the island was Nicosia

Until 1974, all major international flights connected to Nicosia Airport. Located a few kilometers from the capital's center, the port was then the island's main airport and one of the most modern in the Eastern Mediterranean.

It served connections to Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. Cyprus Airways, British European Airways, Middle East Airlines, Olympic Airways, and many other carriers landed there.

For thousands of tourists and locals, it was the first place they saw upon arriving on the island.

The journey looked completely different

It's hard to imagine today, but in the 1960s and early 1970s, flying was still something special for many people.

On board, completely different standards applied than today.

Flight attendants served hot meals on porcelain plates, metal cutlery and glassware were used, and many passengers wore suits or elegant dresses for the journey. The flight itself was treated more as a part of the journey than simply a means of transportation.

What seems almost unbelievable today is that smoking was also permitted on most planes. Cabins were divided into smoking and non-smoking sections, and passengers were surrounded by cigarette smoke for hours during the flight.

Why did planes often land along the way?

Modern jets easily cover the non-stop route from Warsaw to Larnaca. However, a few decades ago, the technical capabilities were much lower.

Airplanes had shorter ranges, so many routes to Cyprus involved one or even several stopovers. These were most often airports in Athens, Beirut, or Cairo, although the route depended on the season, aircraft type, and the airline's network.

However, not every landing meant a regular stop for passengers. In some cases, it could be purely technical – related to refueling, aircraft maintenance, or crew changes.

Extant historical sources have not conclusively confirmed whether passengers could embark or disembark at intermediate ports on all such flights. This question remains of interest to aviation history enthusiasts.

LOT also flew to Nicosia

Few people remember that LOT Polish Airlines also operated flights to Cyprus even before the division of the island.

The connections were operated at a time when Nicosia Airport was the country's main airport, and the routes were adapted to the capabilities of the aircraft at the time and applicable international agreements.

Today, not all the details of these connections can be reconstructed with complete certainty. However, it is known that Nicosia was on LOT's route map even before the events of 1974, and travel to Cyprus then looked completely different than it does today.

Perhaps among our readers there are people who remember those flights or have old tickets, timetables, or photographs from that period. If so, we'd love to hear their stories.

Did you know that…

In the 1960s and early 1970s, passengers on many airlines could smoke cigarettes in-flight without any problem. Smoking bans were gradually implemented in subsequent decades, and only completely disappeared from commercial flights in the late 20th century.

Everything changed in 1974

In the summer of 1974, the Turkish invasion led to the closure of Nicosia Airport. The airport was placed within the UN buffer zone and never resumed regular passenger service.

For the island, this meant the rapid construction of a new main airport. Thus began the history of the Port of Larnaca, which remains the Republic of Cyprus's most important air gateway to this day.

About what the first years of operation of Larnaca Airport were like, when regular flights of LOT Polish Airlines returned and why the flight numbers LO171 and LO172 were remembered for a long time by many passengers, we will tell you in the next article.

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The material was prepared on the basis of archival materials relating to the history of civil aviation, ICAO documents, information from Hermes Airports, LOT Polish Airlines archives and studies devoted to the history of Nicosia Airport.