Although it was chilly up here at altitude yesterday, it was warmer down near sea level. The current weather is at least giving visitors a taste of the answer to the inevitable question, ‘What’s it like in the winter?’ At times, like yesterday, it’s warm in the sun and cold in the shade. From today, it promises to be calmer and warmer, so that should start cheering people up.
I have to wonder about day visitors who set off in full tourist gear, shorts, t-shirts, sandals, with a light jacket for the evening, and come across on one of the open-fronted fast boats, stopping to swim at St George on the way. Fine to start with, even though it’s not the height of summer, because you’re fuelled with excitement and derring-do on your €50 day out, and you’re determined to enjoy it. Fab. Quite right. Sun, swimming, and the entry to our gorgeous harbour. Then, a few hours wandering the streets, enjoying a lunch, maybe taking a dip at one of the dipping places around Harani or at Nos, and then, hurrying back to secure your place in the front of the open-air fast boat back. There, you sit, all pink and satisfied, and off you go, back across the sea in the full glare of the sun, and let your hair flow behind you in the biting breeze. Put on your light jacket, and realise just how burnt your shoulders are, but face to the wind and out across the high seas, having had a great day out. The next day? Skin as stiff as a board, and a nose as red as a traffic light. The moral? Take sensible precautions, and put on sunscreen even when you think you don’t need it.
There were several large parties of herded tourists yesterday, following the half-open blue umbrellas around the town before being freed for an hour or two. The train was running, the Poseidon went out with a group from the Pedi Beach Hotel, the Trawler was busying up around midday onwards as were other eateries, and the harbour was beginning to buzz. All good signs for the summer to come, we hope.
As for me, I had a great success, and it only cost me an extra €2.50. I’d ordered a book from Amazon France, to avoid confusion and delays at customs (which you can fall foul of if you buy from Amazon UK). The seller dispatched my book, which was hard to track down, and I waited. A few weeks later, I received a message from ELTA courier (the post office one) saying that my book could not be delivered. This is standard, and we tend not to take much notice of these messages, because they are usually followed by a ‘delivery waiting for you’ one once the info has been entered into the computer, or something. In this case, though, I hadn’t had one of those, but called into the post office anyway. Nothing in our PO box, but Elias saw me and told me he had something for me, and sure enough, there was the delivery. Yay! But, it cost me €2.50, because, although I had bought it via France, the seller had, I assume, arranged to buy and send it to me from the UK. From Rawtenstall, Lancashire, to be precise, a place I visited once back in the 1980s to admire but not use the dry ski slope. All the same, a small price to pay for a hard-to-find book.
And what was this book? You ask. Mind your own business, I reply… No, seriously, it was the kind of book only someone like me would want, and in this case, need (as research for my current story set in 1894). It is the highly coveted Tower Bridge Operations Manual: 1894 to date. Wonderful! It was like being a teen again. It’s got pictures and everything, including original specs and drawings, and how the thing works. I can now delve in and see if it is possible to use the bridge’s mechanics as a murder device. Well, I never do things by halves, just, maybe, half a bridge at a time.
So, while others were going hot/cold, white/pink on day trips, I was salivating over a book, and that’s what it’s like on Symi in winter… and sometimes in May.
