Symi, The World and other matters
The World was at Symi yesterday (see Neil’s snap below) so I went and had a quick look at the website. I have to say, what you get inside looks nothing like you see from the outside, which, to my mind, is a bit bland. But you can buy your own three bedroom apartment, there’s a chap playing a baby grand piano in the foyer (a job for me?), there’s a gym, all kinds of eateries and even a golf course. Oh, if I had the money… But then again, would I? It would be great to cruise around the world watching the scenery change but you never know who you are going to be rubbing padded shoulders with and you could be trapped on board with… well, with anyone (who owns more than a few million a year, I guess, imagine if Donald Rump came aboard). So I think, if I am ever going to take a cruise, I’ll do it on a smaller boat.
The journey looks nice though. It starts in January (but I expect you can hop on an off at any time) down at the tip of South America, so you’d have to get there, and then cruises up the Atlantic, around Brazil and into the Caribbean before heading across to the top of Africa, around Spain, France, the bottom of the UK, a few fjords later and you’re back again and into the Med – stopping for a day at Symi – and then on through the Suez Canal, down the east coast of Africa and in Indian Ocean, then that straggly bit with lots of islands (Indonesia?) and around some of Australia in time to end the year somewhere near Sydney. Wot? No New Zealand? Not going on that then.
While The World was making her leisurely way around Rhodes the night before, we were part of a party of partygoers who went to Georgio’s and then the Rainbow – I’ll leave you with some photos in a moment. As you can see it was a busy night and that was on a Thursday, so that was good to see. Lefteris the star waiter of the season was working very hard as usual and still had time to laugh with the guests and pose for a photo before finishing his shift and getting ready for school the next day, poor chap. What was really nice, apart from everything else, was the number of people meeting up with old friends, Greek and otherwise, and the festive and friendly atmosphere. It got to the point that Noufris (the owner) was bartering Neil for his shirt (which is actually my shirt) but drew the line at swapping shirts there and then. It was a fun night that included bacon candy and a lot of laughs. Just how a Thursday night should be in our little world.
