One Summer in Santorini

by Sandy Barker

  I’ll have to come back, I decided.

  I turned my attention back to Marie and Gary. They both worked in tourism, which is how they met, and were from California wine country. Travel and wine? We were going to get along great. We’d drink crappy Greek wine and commiserate while we longed for a delicious Californian pinot. They were a super sweet couple too, holding hands and sneaking cute little glances at each other. Ten years. That was certainly something to be proud of.

  Josh went next, taking his sunglasses off and revealing those eyes again. ‘Hi, I’m Josh. I’m from Chicago. This is my first time leaving the US.’ Whoa. Really? I held my breath as I waited for any snippet that would reveal how old he was. ‘Uh, I work in software development, and I’m twenty-eight.’ Did he say he was twenty-eight? So not an infant. Not way off limits. Crap. No, double crap.

  ‘Oh,’ he said, as though remembering something, ‘and I came here because I was watching a Rick Steves episode on Santorini, and I suddenly thought, I have to go there. So, I researched trips for a couple of days and booked this one.’ He smiled, and I could see the excitement in his eyes. So, he’d booked an international trip – his first international trip – practically on a whim. It was as good a reason as any. I’d pretty much done the same thing, only my whim took hold after a sad and lonely night that included a bottle and a half of expensive wine and an entire box of tissues.

  No one said anything after Josh finished, so I put my hand up to go next. ‘Hi, I’m Sarah from Sydney – easy enough to remember, I guess – I teach high school English, which I love – mostly. Sometimes the kids are ratbags, and sometimes there’s too much pointless paperwork, but I like the actual teaching part. I have been to Greece before, but not this part, and not for a really long time. I’m mostly looking forward to the food.’ And then for some reason, I added, ‘And I’m thirty-six.’ I glanced over at Josh. Did he bite his lip when I said that?

  Duncan looked at Patricia, who had fallen asleep, and he artfully skipped over the drunk lady. ‘I’ll be quick. I’m Duncan, and I’m from Townsville in Queensland. I’ve sailed my whole life, and I’ve been working at this job for the past five seasons – which works out well for you lot, ’cause I know my way around the islands, and I know the locals – we’re gonna have an awesome trip.

  ‘Gerry and I met online last year.’ She waved at us all, and I found myself waving back. ‘She’s studying in the UK, and we meet up whenever we can and go travelling together. This trip lined up with the end of her summer break, so I invited her to come along.’ Wow. They were dating long-distance? ‘And, I promise that this –’ he signalled to himself and Gerry ‘– won’t get in the way of this.’ He then signalled to the boat and to us. So apparently my concerns were expected, but I felt like Duncan addressing it head-on was a good thing. Not only a pro, but a proactive pro.

  Then he went on to tell us all the stuff about the boat we needed to know – like what to do if we fell overboard, which was good to know even though I planned not to do that. He saved the toilet talk for last. ‘You can flush the toilet paper down these toilets – it just goes into the water.’ Gross. ‘But, uh, if we’re moored and you need to use the toilet, and it’s heavy and technical, then I’d recommend going ashore and finding a café who’ll let you use theirs. Otherwise, it’s gonna float next to the boat until we leave.’

  The rest of us were stunned into silence. Heavy and technical? So, if I needed to poop while we were docked, I had to go ashore? Great. ‘See you in a few minutes, everyone. Just going for my morning poop!’ Duncan seemed to sense the embarrassed tension – I’m sure it wasn’t the first time he’d experienced it – and broke it with, ‘More cocktails?’

  There was a resounding chorus of ‘Yes, please,’ as the group laughed nervously. Patricia started at the noise. ‘Wait!’ she cried. ‘I didn’t get to do my introduction.’

  ‘How about I make another pitcher of drinks and then we do your intro?’ asked Duncan. That seemed to satisfy her and she sat back regarding the rest of us, almost aggressively. I wondered how much of our introductions she’d heard.

  When we all had fresh drinks in hand, she stood up, albeit a little shakily. ‘I am Patricia,’ she said with more dramatic flourish than the intimate setting called for. ‘I am originally from New York, but now I am a citizen of the world.’ And then she sat down. The rest of us looked at each other, while she sipped her drink and squinted out at the marina. I’d taken my sunglasses off, as the sun was going down, and so had the others. We conveyed a lot to each other without speaking, and I knew we were all onside against Patricia. I even saw Duncan frowning at her.

  I glanced at Josh and he winked at me. I wondered if he was still happy to share a cabin with her. Poor guy. I would have offered to swap with him, but I really didn’t want to.

  ‘I thought we’d head up to the restaurant there for dinner,’ said Duncan, pointing to a café at the top of a giant set of stairs. ‘How does that sound? Early dinner, come back, maybe have some more drinks, then your first night’s sleep on the boat.’

  We all showed our agreement by leaping into action – all of us except Patricia. She stayed put while the rest of us went below for jumpers and jackets and to get money for dinner. Less than ten minutes later, seven of us stood on the pier as Duncan tried one more time to get her to join us. ‘I’m going to stay here and soak it all in,’ she said, dismissing us with a wave of her hand. Soak it all up was probably more like it.

  Gary led the way, and we all followed without a glance back to the boat. The climb left all of us breathing heavily, except Duncan who looked like he ran steep flights of stairs for fun, and we stood at the top catching our respective breaths while he went to get us a table. Without much fuss from the waiter, we were soon seated outside with an incredible view of the sun setting over the marina. There was a lively discussion about what to order, but we left most of it up to Duncan.

  The food came and then kept coming – plates and plates of fresh seafood, horiatiki and tzatziki. We drank watery retsina – actually, I stuck to Mythos, the Greek beer. As we ate, we talked, learning more than the snippets we’d shared a couple of hours before. And we laughed – a lot.

  After I piled another helping of fried calamari onto my plate, I settled back in my chair and looked around the group. All those fears, all those concerns about who they would be and how I would get along with them, had gone. This little group was going to be my floating family for the next week and a half and I already liked them. It felt good being part of this group. It was going to be a great trip.

  And then I remembered Patricia.

  Chapter Four

  Around three the following morning, the snoring from the cabin next door woke me from a restless sleep for the thousandth time. I guessed it was Patricia, because I could hear the melodic undertones of drunkenness. I whispered to Hannah to see if she was awake too.

  ‘Oh my god,’ she whispered back. ‘I’ve been lying here wondering if I could climb down and get into the bathroom without waking you. I’ve got sleeping pills.’

  Sleeping pills? I never thought I would be so excited to hear those two words.

  ‘You sharing?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Then I’ll get ’em. Where are they?’

  ‘In my toiletry bag.’

  I climbed out of my bunk and rooted around in the bathroom in the dark, finally finding both the toiletry bag and the Ambien. Ahh, Ambien. You can’t buy a Kinder Surprise egg in America – choking hazard, apparently – but you can buy a blissful little over-the-counter sleep aid called Ambien.

  It kicked in fast, and when I eventually emerged from a hazy, drug-induced sleep the next morning, it was after nine. I was now properly exhausted; it had been my fourth night in a row of bad sleep and I made a mental note to nap sometime that afternoon – maybe for all of it.

  Hannah was still very much out of it, her face buried in her tiny boat pillow, so I showered as quietly and as quickly as I could, then got dress
ed in the tiny bathroom. It was quite the feat, as water covered every surface, including the floor. I’d tucked my clean clothes inside a cubby to keep them dry during my shower, but I couldn’t outsmart the bathroom design completely.

  It required some rather impressive yoga-like moves to get my clothes onto my body without them getting soaked. And it was a little too early in the trip for a wet T-shirt competition.

  Between the lack of sleep and the rudimentary ablution situation, the whole ‘I’m on holiday’ feeling was quickly becoming a distant memory. Finally dressed, I stepped back into our tiny cabin. I thought about putting my pyjamas and dirty knickers away, but I couldn’t see how to without waking Hannah. I was going to have to get used to being messy – along with tired and a little bit damp.

  When I climbed up on deck, it turned out that Hannah wasn’t the only one still asleep. Gerry was too. Marie was up, but still getting dressed. And Patricia was still sleeping it off. That left me alone with the three men, and it took me about two seconds to realise that no one was eating yet – no one was even having a cup of tea!

  Maybe they thought getting breakfast was women’s work and were waiting for the women to emerge and serve it to them. Perhaps they weren’t sexist at all, just lazy. Either way, I was starving, so I did what anyone who knew her way around a kitchen would do. I offered to make breakfast for everyone.

  ‘Uh, yeah, I bought some basics for brekkie before we left Santorini,’ said Duncan, ‘but we’ll need to stock the pantry when we get to Ios.’ Duncan had told us during our orientation talk that we would all put money into a kitty to share food for breakfast and lunches, and we could buy stuff for ourselves if we wanted anything different.

  Below deck – that’s boat lingo by the way – I hunted through the kitchen, or rather the galley – also boat lingo – and soon realised Duncan had understated ‘some basics’. All I found was two loaves of bread, butter, milk, sugar and teabags – not even instant coffee.

  I had been hankering for Greek yoghurt – would it just be called ‘yoghurt’ in Greece? I made a mental note to add it to the list. I also hoped the shop on our next island stop of Ios sold muesli. I know I was travelling, and I probably should have been thinking about adopting some of the local customs, but I also knew what the Greeks had for breakfast. I wasn’t too keen about starting each day with Nescafé and a cigarette.

  Toast and tea would have to do. I put the kettle on and put two slices of bread into the toaster. While I waited, I looked through all the cubbies for plates, mugs, spoons – the usual kitchen stuff. It wasn’t a large galley, so it didn’t take long to learn my way around.

  ‘Need some help?’ said a sexy American voice from behind me. Josh. I smiled over my shoulder and nodded. Not sexist and not lazy.

  He took over toasting duties while I set about making mugs of tea. I hadn’t bothered asking if everyone wanted toast and tea for breakfast, because that’s all there was. Fifteen minutes later, we carefully climbed the ladder to the deck, him carrying a mountainous plate of buttered toast and me balancing a tray with mugs of tea, milk, and sugar. I was going to get nimble moving around this boat.

  Marie had joined our breakfast club, emerging from her cabin a few minutes after Josh had come down. Everyone gratefully took a mug of tea and a piece of toast. It was quiet in the marina, and I could hear the gentle lapping of the water against boat hulls as we ate and drank in companionable silence. After we decimated the mountain of toast, the conversation turned to the day’s journey to Ios.

  Duncan said it would take about four hours and then we’d have the rest of the day to chillax – his word, not mine – but I was all about some ‘chillaxing’ after that crappy night’s sleep. I was also looking forward to a nap, which I guessed fell under the whole chillaxing umbrella.

  We wouldn’t see Gerry or Hannah until much later that morning, and Patricia wouldn’t emerge from her alcohol-induced coma until the afternoon.

  *

  ‘Wanna steer?’ I looked up from my Kindle, which is sealed in a Ziploc bag for waterproofing, to see that Duncan was talking to me.

  ‘Really?’ I hadn’t known I’d get to steer the boat.

  ‘For sure.’ I looked over at Gary who nodded at me encouragingly.

  ‘Okay, yeah!’

  ‘Stand here.’ I put my Kindle down and stood in front of Duncan. ‘Hold the wheel here and here.’ I held my hands at ten and two like he showed me. ‘It’s not like a car; it takes subtle adjustments. We want to head to the right of that island in the middle of the caldera. You got it?’ I nodded. ‘If we start to go too far in one direction, correct our course, but gently. Okay? And I’ll be here if you need help, or if you get sick of it.’

  ‘Me too,’ added Gary.

  ‘I got it.’ A grin spread across my face. I was sailing! In truth, I was only steering, but it was one of those cool things I could check off my endless bucket list. Some people have a finite bucket list, but I keep adding to mine. I figure it’s the best way to make sure I keep going out and doing things. Imagine saying, ‘I’m done,’ and then staying home for the rest of your life. That would do my head in. So, sailing (okay, steering) a boat through Santorini’s caldera – check!

  It was incredible to feel the responsiveness of the yacht as it sliced through the water. We were sailing under power, as the winds were not cooperating that morning, but it wasn’t like I knew the difference between steering with wind power and engine power. Did I mention I was sailing?

  As we passed to the right of the small island, I could see the town of Fira far above us. It was just as spectacular from the water as it was from within. The contrast between the stark white of the buildings and the craggy, reddish cliffs was incredible. I was definitely regretting not spending more time on Santorini. I promised myself I would return someday, adding to the bucket list again.

  The sun was already hot, even at ten in the morning, and I tipped my heavily sun-screened face towards it. I inhaled deeply and felt the warm, salty air in my lungs. I’d abandoned my hat as soon as we left the marina, because it kept blowing off, and my unfettered hair whipped around my face. I must have looked quite alluring, because it wasn’t long before Josh came and sat close by, anchoring his feet against the boat and gripping the railing with one hand. ‘Having fun?’

  ‘Yes!’ I grinned at him. ‘Did you want to have a go?’ I asked, hopeful he’d say no and I could keep my sailing gig a little longer. He may have picked up on that because he waved off my offer.

  ‘Plenty of time for that. You’re doing a good job.’

  ‘So, how did you sleep?’ I asked.

  ‘Yeah, not that well. That’s some pretty loud snoring. I ended up putting in earplugs. They helped a bit.’

  ‘I thought about you last night.’ Oh crap, not like that. ‘I mean, because of the snoring. Hannah and I were up for most of the night – we took Ambien at around three. I was out after that. She’s probably got more – you should ask her for some.’ Quit rambling, Sarah.

  He shrugged. ‘I guess I can always go sleep in the dining nook if it gets too much.’

  ‘And how is Patricia otherwise? Did you talk to her much?’

  ‘A little when we got back from dinner. She seems pretty interesting. She’s travelled a lot.’ I felt like I’d been rebuked.

  ‘Oh, I didn’t mean anything by that.’

  ‘It’s cool. I didn’t think you did.’

  I hoped not. I didn’t want him thinking I was bitchy. I wasn’t – well, not really. I decided I would talk to Patricia when she eventually woke up – she couldn’t be that bad.

  Several hours later, Patricia emerged wearing a voluminous kaftan and a sour expression. She squinted at us, then sashayed over and plonked down next to Josh. I got a waft of sweat and stale alcohol and tried unsuccessfully to stop my nose from scrunching.

  She can’t be that bad, I reminded myself, but it didn’t take long to regret my decision to engage her in conversation.

  ‘Well, there’
s your problem right there,’ she said. I hate when people say that, as though it’s soooo obvious why you’re soooo stupid.

  ‘Sorry? What do you mean?’

  ‘You went all the way to Lake Titicaca, but you didn’t cross the border into Bolivia? Rookie mistake. You missed the best part!’

  We were talking about my trip to Peru. Her being a citizen of the world, I’d decided that travel would be a safe topic on which we’d find some common ground. I was wrong. Apparently having world citizen status gives you carte blanche to be a superior twat about everywhere you’ve been that other people haven’t.

  ‘Well, I couldn’t really cross the border considering we were on an organised trip.’ She scoffed at this with what sounded like a ‘huff’. I thought it was somewhat hypocritical considering she was currently on an organised trip. ‘Well, anyway, I really enjoyed Peru.’

  I’d given Patricia nearly half-an-hour of my time, and most of it was spent defending myself. I figured that was enough of an effort and decided I was done with her for the duration of the trip.

  And poor Josh was sleeping with her, so to speak.

  ‘Hey, guys, check this out,’ Gary called from the bow of the boat. Grateful for a reason to extricate myself from Patricia’s snarly glare, I climbed up onto the side of the boat and made my way up to join Gary. This may sound easier than it was, because the boat was moving and there wasn’t a lot to hold on to. I had to be very careful I didn’t get pitched over the side into the raging sea. Well, gently rolling sea. Hannah and Marie followed closely behind me, also carefully.

  The boat was rounding the tip of an inlet on Ios and at its mouth was a stunning white church, an island sentry of sorts. Unlike most churches I’d seen on Santorini, it didn’t have blue or gold embellishments – it was stark white, gleaming against the green scrub and red earth of the surrounding hills. Its spire rose from the curve of the roof like three tiers of a wedding cake.