A few photos
A few more photos from the boat trip last weekend. Off out again this morning (more cat food, collect a duvet, find the rent money… usual things) and so only a quick post with a few pics to look at over your morning coffee or tea.
Things to do on Symi: Relax
Everyone’s pretty relaxed around here at the moment. Including the Alarm Cat, as you will see in a moment. It’s been a long weekend of fun and feasting with an around the island boat trip on Friday – a fantastic time as usual – a walk to Pedi on Saturday for lunch, watching the clouds roll past and carry on rolling, a birthday dinner with friends on Saturday at Georgio’s, including live music and much frivolity, and a quiet day on Sunday, with no sign of clouds. This week, so far, looks like it’s going to be quieter with hardly anything in the diary at all.
Before I present you with some photos for today I just wanted to thank everyone who has so far put up a review of ‘Remotely’. Seven five-star reviews so far, and some wonderful comments. It looks like there’s quite a lot of interest in this body-swap, coming of age, gay/straight comedy; a newspaper local to where the story is set, are running a piece on it this month and, so far, sales have been good, for me. It’s out there in Kindle and in paperback and you can find the links from this page: ‘Remotely’ on Amazon. I’m just putting this thought out there but it would make a great gift for someone for Christmas.
And now a few photos from Friday.
One of those days when there’s not enough time to get anything done before heading out to the dentist for 11, then a walk around Yialos and then lunch, then a dash home and a piano playing session and then… well, then we’re collapsing in front of the TV with a good series and having a quiet night in. So, the next few days will probably be photo-only blog posts as we’ve got a day on the boat today and I have to catch up on some work over the weekend.
Here are a few recent shots to keep you going and I’ll aim to have many more for you over the next couple of weeks. Things should return to normal around 26th October, until then, expect short posts and maybe not every day. There’s simply too much fun to be had – it’s like being on holiday, from what I can remember.
Mildly alarming
I’m trying to find out exactly what it’s all about, and maybe someone will let me know, but it seems the police, or coastguard, or someone has set up an early warning system on Symi. I’m not sure what it’s meant to signify as I’ve not heard an announcement (maybe I missed one?) but we’ve now got this air raid siren thing which goes off every now and then. I heard it last week and assumed it was something to do with the coastguard boat that was out in the bay, but yesterday it went off around 11.00 and stayed ‘going off’ (i.e. on) for quite a while, and no sign of the boat. Then it went off again, and again.
There was no sign of imminent invasion, or anyone in trouble, in fact the bells carried on ringing, the guys unloading the van next door carried on chatting and the world seemed to go on as normal. I assume it was a test – but of what? Does this thing go off when someone has been spotted wearing socks with their sandals? Is it to warn the island that the tax inspectors are on their way? Maybe it’s to let everyone know that their coffee is ready. It could be anything, but I suspect it’s more important than any of those. As soon as I find out I’ll let you know, in the meantime, I don’t think there is any reason to be alarmed.
Actually, I’ve now been informed that it’s to do with the military, a drill of some sort – so all is well.
It reminded me of working on summer holiday camps back in the 1980s in Crowthorne, in Berkshire, a few miles distant from Broadmoor, the high security psychiatric hospital. We were working with children with epilepsy in a rather remote old house and grounds not far from the hospital through the woods. They would test the alarm every Monday morning at a certain time and we’d all know that’s what it was, so no panic. Not until the times when it went off at unexpected hours of the day and night. Then we had a Jack Bauer, 24, style protocol in place which basically meant locking everyone inside until the all clear went off. It happened with alarming regularity – but never actually amounted to anything more than a false alarm. Oh, apart from once, but even then we were all safe.
Anyhow. Today is a visit to the dentist day, some piano playing this afternoon and then all clear for the evening. Friday is a day around the island on the boat, the first (and probably last) of the year for us as we don’t often get the time off work. And then a weekend of not much at all is planned, so no news there then. I must away now and create a chicken pie for lunch, after clearing the courtyard of tamarisk shedding and dead leaves from the vine and, of course, seeing to the cat who is very grumpy today and already on his third, semi-ignored, breakfast. Ah, perhaps that’s what the new alarm system is! It signals Jack’s next feeding time and he is in cahoots with the authorities. Wouldn’t surprise me.
End of season? Maybe not
I thought we were heading towards the end of the season and that things would be slowing down. Not so in Yialos with the day boats. They continue to come, bringing day trippers with them who fill certain restaurants and bars, shops and cafes for a few hours each day. If only they were not all wearing all-inclusive wrist bands so that they might actually have some idea of how to see the island and make up their own minds as to where to eat. There are some intrepid go-it-alones included no doubt and some who refuse to follow the herd, but it’s good that those who do have guides who give them a brief history of the island as they wander around trying to avoid buying things.
I don’t know what ‘actually staying on the island’ numbers are like at the moment, but I suspect that’s slowing down. I’ve had a lot of people giving compliments about the island this year, and about my blog and books (thank you all!) but I’ve also had a few moans and I can see where, in some cases, these are coming from. You might want to be aware that a couple of places are now charging more for sunbeds on their beach concessions. I think €3.00 or €3.50 per bed – though other places give them to you for free, or they return your payment if you eat at their taverna, which seems a lot fairer. But there are also some places now charging for the umbrellas – at €2.00 per throw, or rather, per put-up. That does seem a bit daft to me but I can also see why it’s being done.
Everyone is hard up in Greece these days, at least the hard working, summer business folk are with their 16 hour days (at least) and their huge tax hikes and insurance hikes, and pension cuts and extra taxes simply for having a business, for selling this or dealing in that, or simply for… well, anything really. And I guess some folk are thinking that if they up prices they will make more money to pay these things. Surely the better way to do it is to lower prices to attract more custom, where possible? If I had a beach bar with sunbeds, I’d give them away for free not fee (there’s a slogan for you) and certainly wouldn’t charge for the shade. Okay, so you have to buy them and replace them, so charge for the first year, save the replacement cash and then have them for free until they need renewing. That’d get more people to your bar or business, especially when words gets around.
Anyway, just my thoughts on local economy for the day as look out of my window and see the Panagia coming in full up, and the Sea Dreams boat already parked up and emptying its mass of visitors. The weather is set to be warm and fair for a few more weeks, with perhaps some rain briefly next week, and, so far, the season isn’t showing that many signs of slowing down.
