Ice cold in Alex – Day 21

I thought I’d try the kebab van on the hard. Inside the static caravan affair was a very large woman. The van creaked as she moved with the dainty precision of Oliver Hardy. Managing to avoid the charcoal grill on one side and the boiling chip pan on the other.  I made the gesture that said give me the works and she got started. 

Behind me was a man in a hurry so I stood aside. He shouted his order and ran the few yards to the harbour wall where the navigation lights of a small motor cruiser were approaching fast. 

The man spoke into a walkie talkie and I realised that he must be the harbour master. The cruiser damn near rammed the wall and he had a hard time shoving her off. A lot of shouting went on. On the boat were three men who had been fishing for the day. All were a bit giggly.

They half-heartedly threw ropes to the man on the quay but they fell short and kept dropping in the water. Finally he got the bow line around a bollard and handed it back to guy on the front. Turning to the man on the stern. I noticed that the bow line had again been let slip into the water. It then occurred to both me and to him that the three men in the boat were completely paralytic. 

He turned to me and I offered to help. He gestured not to move. At this point both ropes were thrown simultaneously at him hitting his turned back. Causing much laughter from the cabin cruiser. He stooped to pick them up. Coiled them neatly and hurled them back aboard. Picked up his kebab and walked off into the darkness.

Now they were adrift in the harbour with a stalled engine.  

I sat on a plastic chair and watched them try to restart their engine. Shouts and falling over and general exasperated swearing. Finally they drifted alongside a freighter where a nightwatchman threw them a line.

The kebab was a complete meal and had the strongest onions I’d ever eaten. Making my eyes water.

In my pension I was still the only guest.

 After three nights I’d got used to being locked-in alone and sat down in the empty saloon reading. At 10pm there was a power cut so I climbed the stairs to my room. 

3am everything came on again. Lights, AC, even the TV at full volume which I had never turned on. Fully awake now, the power immediately went out again. I spent some time with the torch making sure everything was off.

Next morning, still no electricity, so I paid the elderly owner in cash. She then opened up her reservations book and asked how did the first week of May 2023 suit me? She could give me two weeks. ‘Special price!’ I said I’d think about it. Then there followed an exchange where she insisted we pal up on Facebook.  I told her I wasn’t on Facebook any longer. But she made me show her every screen of my phone’s apps to prove it.

I was hoping for breakfast in my favourite taverna. The chef was making coffee on a camping stove and defrosting chicken quarters with a blow torch.  Could she make me some eggs I asked. ‘No…only coffee. No light.’ she said pointing to a plug socket. I thought of how many times I’d cooked up a full English on a primus stove in the woods. But then I’d been a boy scout.

Met up with Vlad the dentist and his red Cherokee on the dock and we travelled back to Alexandroupoli together. 

He was driving the eight hours back to Bucharest that evening. He asked me what my direction was after Greece. I said that I was tempted by Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica and from there up through France. He looked at me sternly. ‘ Nic, you must go back through the Balkans. They are so beautiful. And the way it’s going there politically, it might be your last chance for a few years.’ The voice of a  central European who was more in tune than I. Yes I thought…he’s right.