Saturday July 11, 1981

Rooftop view.

 _. Our pleasant little hotel manager gave us an alarm call at 7am and we took breakfast for the last time at the Armadoros. Boiled eggs and jam and bread. We went to the jetty in the harbour and sat on a sack of potatoes waiting for our ferry. Philip and Gill joined us and we said our goodbyes, promising to meet them in the White Cross soon. The Lemnos ferry came at 9 and we sailed off into the Aegean waving frantically at our friends. What followed was nine hours up on deck casting our critical eye over the other characters on board with us. I finished reading 'Eye of the Needle'. Ally nodded off but was awakened with a start by a fat Irish woman struggling past to buy her eighth ice cream. We arrived at Piraeus at 6:30 and took a taxi to the Hotel Aphrodite in the Plaka area of Athens. We dumped our things and made our way to the roof garden, six storeys up, to observe the distant Acropolis. Ally was unimpressed by the Greek panorama. She didn't like the scaffolding. I didn't help by making banal comments, like 'it'll be nice when it's finished', &c. Back on the ground we walked to the Parliament building and laughed at the guards doing their ludicrous prancing march. The presidential palace reminded me of Sainsbury's in Gloucester.  A meal followed in a street cafe in the Plaka. Sloppy moussaka. I bought a couple of paperbacks for the homeward flight. We were back in the hotel at 12.

Waiting for the ferry.

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