Andrew has been sailing for more years than he cares to remember, actually more years than he can remember now. Bless him. He likes to reminisce but is a bit fuzzy after 1985. I’m the same. Memory is like that, the recent bits sort of fall out of the top of the bin, but the older bits - the words of all the songs playing in the summer when you met your first love; - who starred in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, sit snugly at the bottom and are easily dredged up. You know the sort of thing “ I remember the summer of 75, no wait it was 76, really hot , me and Elsie Ramsbottom.......” he doesn’t really talk like that but you get the gist.
Anyway we were sailing round the Ionian Isles. Some lovely names – Lefkas, Nidri, Scorpios ( Onassis’ island) Meganisi, Cephalonia and Ithica. I’ve always wanted to go to Ithica, it was the birthplace of Homer and his hero King Odysseus, and of Odysseus’ queen , my namesake, Penelope. So I had to see that and eat at Penelope’s restaurant. She isn’t the original Penelope though. After swanning off for 10 years to the Trojan wars, and spinning some story about sirens and goddesses kidnapping him, Oddy came back, didn’t like the way that she had carried on and bumped Penny off. The current Penelope’s hubby is a nice chap, sort of round and Greek looking, and I can’t imagine any Circe fancying him much, but I can’t imagine him bumping off the missus either.
We called in to Frikes, a small harbour full to overflowing with charter yachts in August, as is the whole Ionian area it seemed. We got in early and enjoyed the spectacle of the late afternoon wind causing panic amongst flotilla crews, and despair in flot captains. It should be called Fracas. Anxious wives/ girl friends nervously clutching ropes, as the skipper for a week, screaming instructions, hurtled towards a wall or another boat, to the enraged shouts of local greek boat owners. “You not anchor there“, “You go back, you go forwards, you go away”
Andrew and I of course have years of experience so we don’t need to communicate much. After 3 weeks we were hardly talking at all! Andrew’s boat is lovely but it doesn’t go too well in reverse ,he says. I don’t know cos I am not allowed to park it, it requires the special ‘parking lobe’ that men think they have in their brains. It’s next to the cricket appreciation lobe. He says his boat was made to go forwards; it certainly goes sideways OK.
We tried to find quiet places to drop anchor. Not easy in the Ionian, they mostly resemble a parking lot in Croydon, but on Ithica we found the perfect place. A bay called Sarakiniko. Just a little beach and a few fishing boats moored with a line ashore. That was our plan. Andrew doesn’t like doing it ‘cos he worries about scratching the boat on the shore. But I hopped into the dinghy and tied a line to a rock. He had anchored some way off so it was quite a long line, about 70/80m., with three fenders attached to it. We really were not going to scratch any rocks, but we did annoy an incoming fishing boat as our line was half way across the bay. So I was told off to row back whilst he reparked. What happened was not my fault, I was gathering up 80m of heavy rope and 3 fenders, watching him re-anchoring , and a rock bit the dinghy. It was a sharp little bit just below the surface, and the dinghy went “psssssssssssssssssssss”. Uhoh I thought. I started rowing out towards the boat , he was still anchoring, so I shouted calmly , “ I’m sinking’ , “what” , “I’m sinking”, “ go back , you’re a hazard “, “I’m effing sinking”.
By the time he had re-anchored, I only had half a dinghy, the seat had collapsed, and one oar and the other half were under water. Of course the boat wasn’t near to where I had tied on so I had to paddle half a dinghy back to the shore, with one hand clutching miles of rope and fenders, to find another rock to tie to.
“Not that one, that one there is better”, he shouted. “***** “ .
When I got back some time later, he was very concerned. Not about me. “My god” he said “ its an enormous gash” ,(less than a centimetre actually), “its irreparable, its too close to the towing point , it needs a specialist, we’ll have to go back to Lefkas”. We did. The dinghy repair man was very happy to agree it was almost irreparable. He arrived with his little repair outfit, explained the intricate process involved, (I didn’t understand of course) and charged 85euros. I think his hourly rate is more than my dentist gets.
The good thing of course that this incident will quickly fade from our memories.
“It was fun sailing in the Ionian wasn’t it “ , “yes, er....... when was that ?”
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