Sandy Barker - One Summer in Santorini

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.

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 dressed 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.