The Trojan Walrus

by Julian Blatchley

  “Well, do the delivery for free too, then. Then I don’t have to deduct the delivery from the owner’s charter income.”

  I didn’t think an owner almost ten thousand miles away was ever going to know very much about how or when his boat got to Samos, and I had my doubts whether his rebate was robust enough to survive so daunting a journey; so I grinned my disagreement.

  “Tell you what; I’ll take the delivery fee, based on two days sailing and two travelling, but I won’t charge for cleaning the boat and handing her over. You fill her up with fuel, and give me enough to put fifty litres in her after the trip... I’ll cover any extra, plus water, and I’ll leave her full at hand-over of course. And you pay my ferry fare back.”

  “Thirty litres of fuel. You wouldn’t need more for a straight delivery. And the owner wants electric shower-pumps putting in, and the fresh water pump needs changing... you do that on the way, for free. And I will pay you for the fuel and delivery when you get back to Poros.”

  “I think I had already guessed that!” I grinned.

  We shook on it, and my soul soared.

  “Oh, by the way,” I added casually, “It’s best to have some crew for a long trip... when you fix the papers could you please put this name on the crew list?”

  I gave him Clemmie’s name and passport number scribbled on a ferry ticket. His eyes rolled up and he invoked the wrath of the Gods4 on me as he realised he had possessed the advantage in the argument all along. But a deal is a deal; he wryly did as he had agreed, muttering darkly that he was sure I had some Greek blood in me somewhere, and I contentedly sailed Mucky Duck down to Poros that evening to pick up Clemmie and my gear. The next morning at four o’clock we were heading out of Poros leaving a deliberately vague idea of our itinerary behind... just in case Spiros had any bright ideas, like taking some paying passengers, or doing a charter on the way.

  The wages of sin, in this particular case, were well worth the effort. Mucky Duck was a good sailing boat of the modern type, two or three years old and in fine condition. She was a Gib-Sea 402, a very reasonable compromise between the older, classical style of boat and the new high-volume types which were taking over the market. She had the wide-beam hull which was now ubiquitous for new charter- boats and a big, broad, comfortable cockpit. Down below there were two double cabins aft, a large vee-berth cabin forward, and a big saloon. We found her a good performer under sail. Because she belonged to an Australian she had an enormous fridge, a cruising chute for going downwind and a ‘Bimini’... a canvas sun cover over the helmsman’s position, which was a very rare feature in Greece at that time. If we had hired her, she would probably have cost a thousand pounds per week in high season.

  As Mucky Duck nodded lazily past Ayios Yeorgios, Clemmie and I basked mother-naked in the midday heat, delighted with our fortunes and just about as contented as the human condition is disposed to be.

  * * *

  The cool of the evening saw us entering Livadhi harbour on the island of Serifos. It had been an almost perfect day... the wind for most of the daylight hours had been a steady, warmish southerly force three, which had kept us moving at about four and a half knots on a close-reach. There had been some light, high skeins of cloud through which the sun had shone without much dilution, so that the middle hours of the day had been agreeably toasty. Lunch had been a poem... I had managed to get a couple of crayfish from a friendly Poros fisherman, and Petros had filled two of the five-litre, handled bottles the Greeks call ‘damzans’5 with his crisp, fruity rosé wine for the trip.

  The sea had not been too skittish, allowing me to teach Clemmie the rather strange swaying motion which is necessary when using a sextant. This is a lateral rocking motion which causes the sun to move in a curve across the horizon, allowing the observer to take the measurement at the lowest point of the arc; teaching how to do this is most easily done by grabbing the trainee’s shoulders and physically imparting the motion, so instructing a naked member of the opposite sex can rarely be anything other than enormous fun... such fun, indeed, that it would probably have led to some extra-curricular activities if Mucky Duck had only had an auto-pilot, but sadly that was one refinement she lacked. We got second prize, however; by late afternoon, a delighted Clemmie had managed three fairly accurate position-lines all on her own.

  Serifos is a roughly round island, rocky and high, with whorls of ancient terracing looping around the intricately folded hillsides. The main port of Livadhi is on the south-east corner, a deep bay in the shape of a reversed letter ‘R’ cutting over a mile into the island, with a ferry quay forming the central indent and a great sweep of beach around its head. Once upon a time minerals were mined here, and there are several ruined loading gantries around the shores; but now there is only tourism, and the week before Easter the port was still mostly closed and shuttered. We moored Mucky Duck at the yacht-quay and, after a quick look at the dusty, closed-up restaurants and shops around the bay, we took the bus to the chora.

  There is a ‘chora’6 on almost every central Aegean island, the main and usually highest village. It may have another name as well, sometimes that of the island itself, but the thing that makes it the ‘chora’ is height, protection and predominance over other settlements on the isle. Here, often in hopelessly inaccessible places, you will find the Dimarxeio, or town hall; the main (and probably only) bank; the post-office; and generally the school. Of the island’s official entities only the police and port police will be down by the ferry quay, where most of their business is and where there is room to park their Toyobishi Dumpsters.

  Aegean Island Greeks of old lived largely from the sea, for these are not fertile islands, like those of the Argo-Saronic. The Cyclades, with the notable exception of Naxos, are craggy and windswept, magnificent in their starkness, with few uncultivated trees and little pasture. Some vines, olives and crops are grown on terraces or in sheltered areas near the sea, but island people developed mainly as fishermen, traders, merchants, and seamen. It made sense to live by the shore, where the work was and where the lower land was more sheltered and easily farmed. It made no sense at all to live on top of a mountain, far from the workplaces of the community and exposed to the frequent strong winds; but there the choras are... perched high on beetling crags, accessed by serpentine roads painstakingly quarried out of solid rock, a testament to immense labour. For centuries the people of the islands have descended to work, and every evening they have climbed back up the mountain again; there to cook, eat, recreate and sleep high above the world, where the winter chill is keen and the wind screeches more than two hundred days a year. The reason for this retreat from the sheltered lowlands and the sea, of course, was piracy. And I’m off on a tangent again.

  * * *

  The Eastern Mediterranean of Medieval and Renaissance times was not a good place in which to live by the seaside. Seafaring marauders, all with a keen understanding of ships and the sea, could be found in almost every waterside community; often they traded or buccaneered alternately, as opportunity allowed. Piracy had been a threat to the Venetians, who had used their maritime might to control it somewhat; but the Ottomans pushed the Venetians back, and the Ottoman Empire never really understood sea-power. Commercialism and seafaring were pursuits below the dignity of an Ottoman, whose only real function in life was supposed to be waging war or high politics, so the Sultans left all the pecuniary stuff to their subject Arab and Christian populations. So long as a reasonable amount of tax came in they were free to get on with. And get on with it they did.

  The entire north African shore was Ottoman in name only for most of the time... sometimes the Sublime Porte, the Ottoman government, would throw its toys out of the harem and brutally execute a bolshie Bey who had gone a bit too far; but generally they were too busy trying to extend the Empire into Europe, fighting the Knights of Saint John or sneaking into the seraglio, and the local Pasha would be left to his own devices. The Egyptians and Algerians were particularly active sea-raiders... names such as Barb
arossa became feared, and the Barbary pirates were a force into the early nineteenth century... and Corsicans, Sardinians and Sicilians all played a part. The Greeks themselves were also notable pirates when opportunity arose,7 and whilst one island might not prey on its immediate neighbours there certainly were fratricidal raids against distant Greek populations. Settlements were not only robbed, there was also a ready market for slaves on the Barbary Coast.

  The Ottomans didn’t really care about this... their trade was mostly conducted by their subjects, so they suffered little direct loss. And in their outlying provinces the ruling Pashas were behind a lot of the piracy in any case, so what came around went around. It was only individuals who suffered, and there was no relief to be had... even if the Ottomans had wanted to stop it, their control of the Pashas was rarely more than nominal, and their inefficient naval forces were far too ungainly and inept to prevail against the skilled, ferocious corsairs in their fast-sailing galleys and xebecs.

  The only protection from this rapine for an islander was therefore to live high up, with narrow streets to aid defence, where you could see who was approaching and, if necessary, run the other way. It wasn’t, in fact, often necessary to run; ill-disciplined corsair crews were not much inclined to climb massive hills and assault alerted, desperate people in narrow alleyways. The mere existence of the chora was usually sufficient deterrent.

  Thus centuries of necessity made the chora the place where the islanders lived; and now in the modern age when local piracy is a no longer even a memory and the beaches are the source of most of the islands wealth, ancient custom still takes the population back up the hill to the chora at night.

  * * *

  In Serifos we climbed up and up through the narrow lanes, between buildings of biblical simplicity. Somewhat less than half of the houses seemed to be occupied... front doors were open in many, and stable-type half-doors were common. Despite a chill in the air old folks sat outside on the spindly, rush-seated Greek chairs, talking quietly. Not one of them failed to welcome us as we went by, and almost all used the greeting xáirete.8

  It seemed impertinent to gaze unbidden into these open doorways, but returning the courtly greetings gave us the excuse to snatch fleeting impressions of the interiors of the iconic cube-dwellings. Some doors had linen or beaded screens providing some measure of privacy, but most were not curtained.

  The interiors were simplistic to the point of being Spartan... a trendy architect would call them ‘minimalist’ or some such neological guff. We glimpsed flag-stone floors, with occasionally a rug but no carpets, and plain, plastered walls; unadorned chairs and tables, sometimes varnished but often painted in bright primary colours; some wood-burning stoves, and a few simple electric hot-plates or gas-rings. There seemed to be many old-fashioned enamel oven-dishes. Beds were made up in living rooms in several houses, and the walls were sparsely hung with icons, photographs, simple plate racks, and lace. Lace seemed to be the only frippery in these austere homes fashioned almost into the rock.

  Apart from the cooking arrangements, the only definitively twentieth century appliances I saw were light bulbs, rather dated transistor radios and the occasional refrigerator. There was the impression of pristine cleanliness and the pride of the inhabitants was evident in the carefully maintained whitewash within and without, in the bright colours and in the sheen of the floors.

  Dinner in the square by the town hall was pleasant, and we had a drink or two in a bar near the bus-stop before we realised that we had misread the time-table... we were reading the times for the Easter weekend. The bus had already finished for the night, and when I asked if there was a taxi the bartender said yes, certainly... in June. So we set out walking under a half moon.

  It is probably five or six kilometres to the port, maybe more the way the road winds, but we didn’t really care. We chatted and chuckled, held hands at times, and enjoyed the panoramic view of the bay and distant lights on the adjacent island of Sinfos. We would probably have burst into song once we left the houses behind, but suddenly lights flared behind us and a great air-horn nearly blasted us off the road. The bus screeched to a halt, and a grinning face beckoned us in.

  Apparently the driver had been having a drink after work, and someone had told him we were walking down, so he had come especially to get us... unspeakably nice of him, but he was in a hurry to get back to his friends and the way he went down that road quickly had me wondering how many drinks he had in fact managed to consume before hearing of our plight. I gripped the rail in front of me until I almost bent it. The driver heaved the wheel back and forth with great, dramatic arcs of muscular forearms as he bellowed his undying commitment to Olympiakos and Leeds United over his shoulder. Clemmie started out holding me, but soon decided I wasn’t firm enough and shifted her grip to the rail; I meanwhile braced my foot against the seat on the opposite side to prevent us both being flung into the aisle on right-handers.

  The bus dumped us by the quay. The driver did his duty to the community by accepting our fares, which wouldn’t even have paid for the rubber he had lost off the tyres in his waterfall descent. Then he solemnly handed out two tickets and the change, declined to accept a tip, and roared back up the hill. We stood on the quay watching the lights weaving up into the night, the crescendo and clash of uphill gear changes still audible faintly in the still air and the blare of the horn reaching us a few seconds after the bus turned each corner.

  We ended the night with a final glass at the single taverna open on the beach, very satisfied with life and thinking how wonderful the bay of Livadhi must be on a hot summers evening, with music spilling out of the numerous tavernas and the tables on the sand under the flame-trees.

  * * *

  Next morning found us motoring south-east. We had wanted to see the island of Naxos, which is unique in the Cyclades for its forestation and fertility. Clemmie, whose expensive education had inevitably included a hogshead or two of mythology, had gleefully informed me of the policy of Phaedra and her Maenads with regard to men on that island9, but I am sure that it was really the weather report from the port police which dissuaded me from visiting. Some strong southerlies were forecast in about two days’ time, and the pilot book was not enthusiastic about the safety of the harbour, so I decided to drop in to Sifnos and then duck underneath Paros and Naxos to take a look at Irakleia, which faced north and looked like a great place to hide from a southerly. Then we could head north-east for Samos via Dhonoussa if the southerly was not too strong, or hide for a while if it blew a belter.

  We tied up in sleepy Kamares, the main port of Sifnos, for a few hours and took lunch in the village of Artemonas, which is a short, stiff walk above the chora, Appolonia. From the terrace of our restaurant a stunning tableaux of islands lay before us... Dhespotico, Anti-Paros, Paros and Naxos stacked neatly one behind another; below them Irakleia and Skhinoussa; and far away to the south the fuzzy humps of Folegandros, Sikinos and Ios. The thought that all this lay at our whim and pleasure was almost too much to bear; and we experienced a bitter-sweet conflict of emotions, the joy of such freedom and choice countered by a deep regret that our time was so limited.

  We loved Artemonas, with its whitewashed purity and panoramic views in every direction. It sits on the crest of the island, open in places to the east as described and also to the west, with views to Serifos and Milos. We would happily have lingered but, like children at Christmas, we simply had to open the next present before playing with the first. In barely three hours we were back aboard Mucky Duck, setting our cruising chute to a soft northerly.

  As soon as the water began to chuckle under our bow, a lazy school of dolphins appeared and flickered effortlessly under the forefoot. Great, grey creatures, over two metres long and as clear as could be in the pellucid water, they rolled sideways and returned our enchanted gaze with that slight hook to their mouths that dolphins have, and which so resembles the loving but slightly smug smile of a parent who has got the better of a wily child. Every rippling m
uscle, every mark, every scar on their bodies and every notch on their fins, even the pupils of their eyes could be made out in the crystalline, cobalt sea. When they left, we dropped the sails on deck and left Mucky Duck to her own devices for a while... no-one of any sentiment at all could possibly have done anything else.

  We passed that evening anchored in beautiful Dhespotico. I bought a large, fresh fagri, a red bream type of fish, from a fisherman, and whilst I grilled the delicious, firm, flaky white flesh over a fire on the beach Clemmie played her wild, romantic folk tunes and the sun sank behind Sifnos. No amount of money could possibly have given us more than we already had... except time.

  * * *

  The next day dawned under a sulky sky, a grizzled canopy which exuded discontent like a child which has five sprouts to eat before it can have its ice cream. We set off eastwards using the engine and wearing rather more clothing. The cloud put paid to astro-navigation, so we did a bit of chart-work to mitigate the tedium of motoring under the miserable clag; but after an hour or so the promised south wind began to set in and we got some sails up.

  By the time we reached Irakleia, we felt more as if we had landed in a different continent by aeroplane rather than travelled a short distance by boat. The grey, blustery showers, the increasingly miasmic visibility and the deserted appearance of Irakleia seemed a hemisphere away from the radiance, clarity and amiability of Sifnos twenty-four hours before.

  The harbour at Irakleia is roughly square, with a sandy beach across the southern side and short quay partly closing the northern one. Yachts usually make fast on the inside of the quay, facing south towards the beach; but with a southerly of unknown strength forecast I decided to use the north side, effectively tying up on the outside of the harbour. There was, for a change, method in my madness.

  I was already aware of the funny things that wind does when it hits an Aegean island. It goes up the windward side all well-behaved, as if butter wouldn’t melt in its mouth, but what it gets up to at the top I simply don’t know... perhaps it is tired and cross after the climb, or maybe it holds a trade union meeting, or something. Possibly it absorbs from its contact with the land the characteristics of the Greeks themselves, and it is merely reckless enthusiasm which compels it to behave like a harum-scarum kid on a skateboard. Whatever the reason, it comes down the other side in a series of powerful squalls which the Greeks call spilliades; tumultuous gusts that howl like a banshee and batter the bejaysus out of anything in their way.10 Knowing this, I snugged Mucky Duck down on the outer northern side of the quay next to the ferry-ramp, where the wind would hold us off the jetty and the weight of these spilliades would be taken on our stern-lines.