Take a Break

An excerpt from My French Platter Replenished describing to Steve my ‘unusual’ experience with the French health check-ups, by Annemarie Rawson.

Finally Steve and I were both registered in the French medical system. Fundamental to getting our carte Vitale was the necessity to have our birth and marriage certificates translated into French by an authorised agent and submitted to the authorities which took an inordinate amount of time to get done. 

We’d registered with a medical practice in Gaillac—the Drs Chalan, a French husband and wife team recommended by Denise. Both spoke a little English, although hers was better than his. I’d somehow severely twisted my back, could hardly walk and the pain was intense. Steve whizzed me down in the car to the doctors’ surgery, with me yelping in pain on every bump he went over. I couldn’t get comfortable at all. It was just awful.

My appointment was with Mr/Dr Chalan, who was very thorough and gave me an injection in my bottom to give immediate pain relief. My God, the sting from the jab caused me more pain for the first ten minutes. It was so deep, intense and excruciating, I hobbled around the surgery whimpering, with tears streaming down my face. After a week of medication and rest when I could, my back slowly came right. With the amount of bed-making I did, it needed to be fixed.

I booked a return visit to see the doctor as I wanted a referral to visit an osteopath to get some proper work done on my back. This time I saw Mrs/Dr Chalan who was also extremely thorough. She sent me for full blood tests and gave me a slip to get a bone density test done. In France if you want to do any physical activity, such as yoga, join a gym or play sport, you have to provide a clearance letter from your doctor. On a practical level, all the letter states is that your blood pressure and heart are fine. That’s if they are, of course. I wanted to attend a keep-fit class so the doctor gave me a letter for this, too. I was very impressed with Mrs/Dr Chalan.

A few months on, it was time for me to have my annual physical check-ups—a mammogram and smear test. What a vastly different experience these were compared to those done in Auckland.

‘How did you get on?’ Steve asked when I walked through the door late one afternoon, feeling a little flummoxed from the check-ups.

‘Well, where do I begin? It was certainly different. When she asked me to remove my lower clothing, I did so, looking for the sheet to cover myself. There wasn’t one. Nor was there a screen or curtain to pull around me. I lay there starkers, Steve, while she fussed about getting gloves on and preparing the speculum.’

He screwed his face up. ‘What’s a…what’s a speculum?’ 

‘Oh it’s a thing to, to…oh it doesn’t matter!’ I snapped, filling the kettle at the sink. I was badly in need of a cup of tea and couldn’t be bothered to explain. ‘The weird thing was there was no modesty about the whole experience. I wasn’t exactly embarrassed but I did cover my lady bits with my hands while she got ready. It was really quite odd.’ I stood gazing out of the kitchen window, thinking about it, while the kettle boiled.

With the tea made, I took the cups and saucers from the dresser, putting them on the table. I turned to Steve and leant back against the countertop, folding my arms.

‘Then I went for my mammogram, just across the road. The nurse who showed me into the consulting room was French and…’ I stopped talking. Steve was obviously engrossed in something on the laptop. ‘Are you listening to me? You asked how I got on so I’m telling you.’

‘What? Oh, sorry, yes, go on.’ He was contrite, moving his laptop to one side.

‘The nurse was French and she didn’t speak English. She indicated for me to remove my upper clothing and to leave my things on the chair.’ I poured the tea and took a cup over to him. ‘I looked around for the gown that’s always provided back home but there wasn’t one. In Auckland we always wear a gown and when the radiographer’s ready, you open one side of it and she manipulates your breast between the plates.’ I stopped to draw breath and gulped a welcome mouthful of tea. Steve was still paying attention and listening, probably because I mentioned breasts.

‘There I stood, topless, while she put the X-ray plates into the machine. The nurse then manhandled me into the right position, mashing my breast between two icily cold plates. With a quick swivel around and a change of sides, she then flattened the other breast.’ I winced, remembering the pain.

‘So really, it’s much like a hamburger patty, slapped between two buns, wouldn’t you say?’ Steve smirked and snorted behind his tea cup, enjoying his silly joke. I just rolled my eyes at him and carried on as if I hadn’t heard him. 

‘When the radiographer finished, I reached for my clothing. She said in a very stern voice, “Non, madame, non, non, non. S’il vous plaît. Arrêter.” Well I understood that but I thought she meant please stop and wait for your results but she meant stop, don’t put your clothes back on. I sat there, Steve, and waited topless for the doctor. I was getting cold and must have waited a full ten minutes with my arms wrapped around my body and covering my breasts. I got the general impression nudity wasn’t an issue for French women. They seemed proud of their bodies, no matter what size, which is a great thing. The doctor duly arrived and was very nice.’ 

I took a sip of tea and continued.

‘He was Indian, raised in London and spoke the queen’s English. Communication wasn’t a problem and he maintained excellent eye contact throughout our conversation. His eyes never moved below my chin as he asked me to lie down and proceeded to squirt gel onto each breast.’ 

‘What a gentleman!’ Steve grinned inanely. I ignored that as well.

‘During the ultrasound, he completed several circuits with the probe, concentrating hard on the screen in front of him. Throughout the entire procedure, he kept up continuous chit-chat about his life in France, the beauty of New Zealand and how he loved London. I think he was putting me at my ease.’

I finished my tea, putting the cup and saucer in the sink, then collected Steve’s from the desk. 

‘As soon as the specialist finished, he abruptly stood up, declaring there was nothing to worry about, wished me a good day and exited the room.’ 

‘Well that was an experience alright.’ Steve slapped his laptop shut and headed for the door. ‘I’m off to do some garden work.’ He stopped in his tracks and turned. ‘Oh and what’s for dinner? I’m starving.’ That man’s stomach ruled his life.

I let out a deep sigh and watched Steve through the window as he traipsed up the steps beside the cottage to the veggie beds. I didn’t know why I bothered telling him. All he needed to know was that everything was fine. When he’d asked, ‘How did you get on?’ I should’ve just said, ‘All good, thanks,’ and left it at that. I never learn.

If you’d like to read more, this excerpt comes from My French Platter Replenished, the second book in my series.

Travel writer Jules Brown describes a romance that blossomed during a wet Scottish summer holiday.

“How come you never mention me in any of your travel stories?” says Elaine.

I’m tempted to say that I just have, and write “The End”, but I have a feeling that won’t go down well.

She has a point. Mostly, I write in the first person. I go to places and report back. There is the occasional “we” in my stories and adventures, and sometimes that other person is Elaine and sometimes it isn’t. But I hardly ever name names and, Elaine is right, she is never mentioned. Though we are up to three times now in the first hundred words, so I’m trying my best here.

Actually, what she really means is, “Look buster, how come you didn’t mention me, when I was there with you on that trip?”

At least it sounds like “buster”. Elaine is and can speak Irish, and the only Irish word I know is sasanach, which if you’re English can be considered more or less derogatory depending on context. If an Irish person calls you a sasanach, you need to check if they are smiling at you or chasing you with a pointed stick.

What she’s driving at is my tendency to pretend that I was on my own in a place when I wasn’t.

She’ll peer over my shoulder as I’m writing sometimes and say, “That’s very funny, only wasn’t that actually my joke?”

Or she’ll say, “Why don’t you put me in that bit? After all, I drove you there.”

It’s true, that this is how I present most of my travels – as if I was there on my own. And quite often I was. For almost all my guidebook days for Rough Guides I travelled solo because, let’s face it, no one wanted to come to the timber-filled towns of central Sweden for two months to watch me copy down restaurant menus and inspect backpacker hostels.

But I’ve also spent thirty-odd years travelling with other people – on press trips, weekends away, city breaks, journeys, excursions and even good old holidays. Yet I’ve written many of these trips up as if I went on my own – even, dare I say, some of the stories in this book.

It isn’t, I hope, an ego thing. It’s not about advertising my importance. The destinations – the places I go – all get on fine without me, I’m sure.

But it is a conscious decision and, without sounding too pretentious, it’s about style. I’ve never been a “my companion and I” kind of travel writer, skimming the surface of a destination. I think my job is to do a bit more than just describe and inform. I enjoy visiting places that provoke thoughts and feelings, and I like to share those. Sense of place is important to me; I want to transmit the kind of details that really help you understand what a place looks, feels and smells like. And while I have lots of my own experiences to draw upon, I also spend quite a lot of time eavesdropping, listening in, overhearing, or watching from afar and then writing down the good bits. 

Presenting it all as a single, personal experience helps crystallise the things that I have understood about a destination. I like to think that my writing has a strength and a flow that derives from this first-person telling – without getting sidetracked by mentions of friends, companions and strangers, whose names and presence you then have to register. With my writing, on the whole you don’t have to ask yourself who this Dave is, who has just made a most excellent joke about Swedish timber production. I just nick Dave’s joke and use it to embellish my own account, because I think it will make for a better read.

None of this butters any parsnips with Elaine, who fixes me with the sort of look she usually reserves for English people who insist – despite her repeated corrections – that she comes from “Southern Ireland.” The sort of look you would receive if you pointed out that, technically, Ireland forms part of what’s known as the “British Isles”, and don’t give me that look, I didn’t come up with the designation, talk to the geographers.

She is not a Dave, Elaine points out. She is my beloved. And it’s about time she got some credit.

So because I know what’s good for me – ie, Elaine – I’m sharing the story of a trip we made together that, in normal circumstances, I might be tempted to pass off as my own singular experience. A story that comes with Added Elaine and that will be all the better for it.

“You pick a place,” says Elaine, “you’re the travel writer and I really don’t mind.”

We have been seeing each other for a few months. Summer’s coming up. A first holiday together has been mentioned.

To be fair to Elaine, knowing that I’m a travel writer, she could have certain reasonable expectations. She knows that I have written books about Sicily, Spain and Portugal, for example. She’s seen the map, she knows how far south they are. We have talked about sitting in cafés, overlooking harbours, eating seafood and drinking chilled wine. We’ve looked forward to long, lazy strolls in Mediterranean towns and nightcaps under palm trees.

“Ullapool,” I say.

“Right,” she says.

“It’s in Scotland. Quite a long way up in Scotland.”

“Right,” she says again. “Does it have summer?”

“Does it have summer?”, I say. “You bet it has summer. It has an oceanic climate and an average of 1,105 sunshine hours per year.”

“Have you been looking at the internet?”, says Elaine.

I have. Although it sounds impressive, eleven hundred hours of sunshine a year actually isn’t very much. I have also omitted the part about Ullapool being cloudier than any other place in Europe. That seems to me to be on a need-to-know basis. If you draw a horizontal line on a map, Ullapool is at about the same latitude as Newfoundland, Norway and Estonia, none of which are known for their balmy summers. I decide not to mention that either.

“And why are we going to Ullapool?”, says Elaine.

I’m on firmer ground here. Because it sounds really cool. Because it’s on a deep loch surrounded by gnarled mountains and looks a little bit like Norway transplanted to Scotland. Because it’s further north than Moscow and because Russian fishing vessels used to pitch up and drink the local pubs dry, just like in Local Hero. Because neither of us has ever been and getting there will be an adventure.

Although I don’t know her very well yet, I do know that if Elaine says she really doesn’t mind something, then she doesn’t. She’s positive and enthusiastic about everything. She sees the best in everyone and every situation. Elaine will not be counting the hours of sunshine and examining the cloud layer, and then bringing up the damning facts later in a general discussion about the shortcomings of my holiday choice. If I say Ullapool will be cool, she’s happy to take my word for it and throw herself into the adventure. This wholesome approach to life is one of the innumerable reasons that, many years later, she is still my beloved and getting a whole story to herself.

We drive up to Ullapool from northern England, which turns out to be quite the undertaking, involving driving half the length of the entire UK. That will teach me for looking at the Google map and thinking it looked about six inches away. It takes three hours just to cross the border, after which there is still a lot of Scotland to go. The scenery becomes increasingly dramatic as we skirt the Cairngorms en route to Inverness, barrelling along the A9, the longest road in Scotland. It’s wild, big-sky country, on a route that sweeps over passes and down through broad valleys, past isolated dwellings and hamlets.

By now the road signs are in Gaelic as well as English, which is close enough to Irish at times for Elaine to offer a running commentary on the presumed attractions of the places we pass.

“Let’s see, ‘the bright harbour of the gentle fairy’ is in fact … wait for it, let me look, oh a tweed factory outlet.”

The weather is entirely as predicted, which is to say cloudy. For the last hour of the drive – through bleak moorland and past bare hills and grey-tinted lochs – it gets progressively darker, until the final run along the eastern shore of Loch Broom when the weather basically goes, sod it, and slings sheets of heavy rain against the windscreen. We follow the SatNav to the holiday cottage we’ve rented, high above the loch, and traipse around after the owner through damp-smelling room after damp-smelling room as she points out the wood-burning stove and the storage radiators for “if it gets a wee bit chilly in the evenings.”

If. Wee bit.

You can see your breath in the air outside. Rain is lashing against a window that should, in theory, offer an uninterrupted view over the glories of Ullapool but instead offers an unrivalled view of rain. In the chilliness stakes, the house is whatever the opposite of a “wee bit” is. It’s late afternoon in August. This is our summer holiday.

“Does it ever stop raining?”, I ask.

“I don’t know,” says the woman, “I’m only fifty-five.”

We both think we’re joking, but it’s difficult to tell.

Elaine and I wait until we hear her car disappear down the drive and then switch on every radiator we can find. We locate the wood store and light the log-burner and make a pinkie-promise that it is never to go out, not on our watch, no sirree. We leaf through the binder of information about the house, where there are humorous injunctions against using the heating in summer unless you want to be liable for a twenty-five-pound surcharge. We laugh – laugh I tell you! – in the face of such impertinence, safe in the knowledge that we’ve spent twenty-five quid in the last hour already and there’s plenty more where that came from. Over the next week, our proudest achievement is that we kept that sucker burning twenty-four-seven, until we could bask in the lounge in T-shirts and sip the best – all right, only – cheeky little rosé that Ullapool’s Tesco could provide.

Although I don’t know her very well yet, I am comforted by the fact that Elaine would rather be warm than cold. She doesn’t ask why I have switched the oven on and propped its door open, and I have to say I like that in a person.

Because it’s our first night and it’s freezing, we pile log upon log for later and call a taxi to take us the short distance into town for dinner. Because, drinking. And rain.

We get a very chatty taxi driver who fulfils all the possible impenetrable-accent clichés you could want by being virtually impossible to understand while sat in the back seat of a Skoda Octavia. As she turfs us out in a backstreet in Ullapool, she hands us a card that says “Pam’s Taxis” and says, “Gi’ us a call, when you want a toksi, ask for Pom.”

I have never heard anyone do that to vowels before. Pom, needless to say, is our go-to gal for toksis for the rest of the week.

Dinner is in The Ceilidh Place, which is recommended far and wide but is on the wee bit chilly side too. I’d say that I’m overly sensitive – born in Africa, fan of the Med, constitutionally averse to cold weather – except that Elaine is from County Wicklow where, as far as anyone knows, it has never stopped raining. And she thinks they should switch their heating up too, so we finish dinner quickly and walk around the harbour to The Ferry Boat Inn for a nightcap before summoning Pom.

To me, a nightcap is another glass of red wine and an espresso if they have one. I don’t expect to sleep, don’t worry. But the bar in the Ferry Boat Inn prides itself on its single malt whiskies and, if you like that sort of thing, you’re in for a treat. The Scots do love whisky, it’s a fact. They bang on about the distilleries, the peat and the smoky taste, all night if you let them. The Ferry Boat Inn has about a thousand different varieties on little shelves and a very keen barman who can tell you at which remote waterfall they collected the water and what side of the valley the peat was dug.

“Will you have a wee dram of whisky?”, he says. “Our single malts are very special. You should have one. Here, let me recommend one for you.”

He has no idea.

What you have to understand about an Irishwoman of certain opinion is that she has endured eight hundred years of being told what to do by non-Irish people, mostly English it’s true, but anyone in the UK basically has to watch their step.

“Do you have a Jameson’s?”, says Elaine. She pronounces it “Jemmeson’s”, like it should be pronounced and not like the way English or Scottish people say it.

“I don’t think I’m familiar with that name,” says the barman boldly, for he has no idea.

“Well, I don’t really like Scottish whisky,” says Elaine. “So I’d prefer a Jameson’s, the Irish whiskey, I’ll have one of those.”

He looks aghast – “not liking” Scottish whisky has clearly never occurred to him as a concept. Also, he has no idea he’s just been schooled in the use of the extra and correct Irish ‘e’ in the word “whiskey.”

Because I don’t know her very well yet, this is a revelation to me. I would have drunk the Scottish whisky, just to be polite. I’m English, and if there’s one thing an English person is more afraid of than making a fuss in public it’s upsetting a Scottish person. It usually ends badly on a battlefield somewhere.

But Elaine is proudly Irish and, as she has pointed out, she doesn’t like the peaty, smoky Scottish stuff, however much you bang on about it. She wants and gets a proper whiskey by simply asking for it, and I can see that this confidence is a useful skill to have. I make a note to stick closely to her, on the basis that if I find myself being too English for my own good, I can always get an Irishwoman of certain opinion to do my asking for me.

The next day it’s overcast and drizzling, which is a distinct improvement in the summer weather, so we take the chance to look around Ullapool between showers.

It’s only small – a couple of thousand people all told – with a grid of white-painted houses spreading across a small promontory sticking out into the loch. It wouldn’t be exactly right to call the town attractive, but that’s not exactly fair either. It’s a working port, with all that that entails, and it doesn’t have anything to prove to the likes of us. But the location is stunning, on a narrow fjord hemmed in by mountains that are the very definition of sullen and brooding on a day like today. A Viking called Ulla probably settled down here some time back in the ninth century – I dare say the terrible weather reminded him of home – and for hundreds of years afterwards Ullapool comprised just a few crofts and farms clinging tenaciously to both sides of Loch Broom, making the sort of living that never bothered anyone.

The modern town dates back around two hundred and fifty years, to when herring started to be landed here in huge numbers. The British Fisheries Society planned for grand things and laid out orderly streets, public buildings and a large harbour with curing sheds and warehouses. What they hadn’t bargained for was the disappearance of the herring shoals from the whole of the west coast, which ruined the new town within twenty years. It wasn’t until the 1970s that Ullapool was a successful fishing port once again, this time attracting Russian factory ships.

That era has gone too now, leaving tourism as the mainstay, though life still revolves around the deep-water harbour. While we watch, ferries come and go to Stornaway in the Outer Hebrides, and tons of other smaller boats flit about in the mid-distance, doubtless doing complicated things with fish and nets. I’m always rather in awe of people who make a living from the sea. Fair play to them. On any given day, I can think of many, many things that I would rather do than ride the swell in a freezing sea with chaps in yellow oils manhandling a great deal of ice and fish.

We make a discovery, which is that there is a little man in a car park with a fresh fish stall. He sells us a slab of hake off a boat and half a dozen enormous scallops, which he claims have been hand-gathered by a man in a diving suit. Which is entirely the sort of thing I might tell two tourists if I was trying to get them to part with their money. To give him his due, the fish and shellfish are amazing – beautifully firm, fresh and sweet – and a trip to the fish stall becomes a regular occurrence. By the end of the week we are flash-frying scallops in butter for breakfast, just because we can, and although I don’t know Elaine very well yet, it seems to me that I could spend more of my days with someone who will gladly eat hand-dived scallops for breakfast.

Over the next few days we venture further out, driving on wild and winding roads to places with extraordinarily alluring names – Achiltibuie (‘field of the yellow-haired boy’), Inchnadamph (‘meadow of the stags’) and SasanachEejit (‘missed turn by the English driver’), although I think Elaine is making one of those up. When the clouds clear, we look out from the fractured coastline to the uninhabited Summer Isles and idly wonder how much an island costs these days. By the lonely, waterside ruins of Ardvreck Castle on Loch Assynt, we brush through wet heather to stand in the shelter of five-hundred-year-old stones and idly wonder how much a castle costs these days. Idle wondering is very much the pastime du jour on these drives, on account of the rolling mist and the ever-present sound of the pattering rain.

“Is this still my summer holiday?” says Elaine, pointedly emphasizing the word “summer.” I assure her it is and switch the heating up in the car.

At Lochinver, an hour’s drive from Ullapool, we see a sign saying “Pie Shop”, which is a very cheering thing to spot on a Scottish summer holiday. We stock up in the Lochinver Larder and then drive further north around the coast on a precarious road to Achmelvich and Clachtoll. Even in the rain, we can see that these deserted beaches are something special. Grassy mounds and black rocks tumble down to perfect arcs of white sand, and despite the half-light of a rain-soaked August the water has a hint of turquoise in it. We dare each other to stand barefoot in the freezing surf and then, before I know it, Elaine has gone one further. She strips down to a concealed bathing suit, strides in and dips her shoulders under, swimming in water that is turning my feet blue. I resist every entreaty and threat because I’m laughably and reservedly English – no it’s freezing, don’t be daft, what if someone sees us – and not outgoing and Irish – ah sure it’s grand, you big eejit.

We sit under blankets in collapsible camping chairs that we have wrestled across the dunes, and eat pies and drink thermos-flask tea under an umbrella that is really only big enough for one. We watch dark clouds roil the sky and warm our fingers on hot plastic cups.

“Is this still my summer holiday?”, says Elaine. I assure her that it is and wipe drops of rain from her cheek.

Even now, years later, I can’t guarantee that I can tell you what colour Elaine’s eyes are, how many cousins she’s got or what her confirmation name is. She’ll have a favourite colour, I’m sure, but I couldn’t tell you what it is. I’m only a man after all.

But I remember every second of Ullapool in all its glorious, rain-spattered, log-fire-burning, breath-chilling, toksi-taking clarity. And I can recall the point at which I stopped not knowing Elaine very well and started thinking about the future. About travelling together, finding our place in the world and growing old in each other’s company. About making each other better by being together, sitting hand in hand on remote white-sand beaches, and hoping for the sun but never minding the rain.

If you’d like to read more travel adventures, this excerpt comes from Never Pack an Ice-Axe: Tales From a Travel Writer’s Life by Jules Brown.

Find out more about the living in the beautiful Algarve in Portugal with an excerpt from ‘A New Life in the Algarve, Portugal – An anthology of life stories’ by Alyson Sheldrake.

It all started almost twenty years ago now. Although it’s hard to believe all that time has passed. In my head I’m still in my early thirties, proudly wearing a police uniform and chatting with friends. My husband, Dave, and I must have looked tired as our friends told us about a fabulous holiday they had enjoyed in the Algarve.

“Never mind,” they said, “you’re going away soon, aren’t you? You’ll be able to have a nice rest and recharge your batteries.”

“Actually, we’ve just returned from a trip to Spain. Do we look that bad?!”

I asked them to tell us more about where they had been.

“We have a friend that owns a little fisherman’s cottage in a tiny village in the Algarve. It’s beautiful and very peaceful. You’d love it.”

I was intrigued. Our friends were glowing with health and certainly seemed enthusiastic about a country we had never visited.

“I don’t suppose your friend would let us rent the cottage for a week, would they?” I cheekily asked.

“I don’t see why not; she only charges us £100 a week. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind you staying there. I’ll give her a call and ask her, and let you know.”

A week later, we had booked our flight to Faro airport, and we were clutching a key and a scruffy set of directions.

Our holiday motto had always been ‘never go back to the same place twice’, and we had enjoyed exploring a range of different countries and places since we had first met. Venice, Hong Kong, The Caribbean, and a memorable and wonderful honeymoon in Cape Town, South Africa, had all been highlights of our travels. We were interested to see how Portugal would measure up.

We set off in the hire car from the airport, heading west along the Algarve. There was a moment which is still set firmly in my mind as one of those ‘gasp’ moments when we rounded a corner into Ferragudo, which was to be our home for the week. The bay opened out in front of us, and we saw the village reflected in the glistening water of the Arade river. Painted boats were tied up, bobbing with the tide, the houses seemed to tumble down to the riverfront, and the majestic, whitewashed church sat proudly above them keeping watch. It was idyllic.

It was a good job there wasn’t a car behind us as we slowed down, took in the stunning view in front of us, and rather inarticulately and ridiculously both said “Wow!” at the same time.

Ferragudo still has that effect on me today. It is a pretty little traditional fishing village with winding cobbled streets, a harbour full of boats, a central square with little cafés and restaurants, and a beautiful long stretch of beach tucked around the corner from the lifeboat station.

Every time I drive to Ferragudo and the village comes into view, it still makes me say ‘Wow!’ inside, and gives me a sense of calm and peace that nowhere else has quite managed to achieve.

We were hooked from that moment on. The initial belief that this was going to be ‘just another holiday’ quickly turned into a magical week of exploring and discovery, as every day gave us new things to enjoy and experience, and every red circle on the map we drew led us to ten more places that we wanted to visit.

We discovered the west coast with its stunning coastline, dramatic cliffs, wide open skies and beautiful unspoilt beaches, hidden traditional villages, gentle friendly people, wonderful simple food, and a slower pace of life. We were smitten.

That was the start of our love affair with the Algarve. We returned to ‘our’ fisherman’s cottage seven times in the subsequent two-and-a-half years. It became the only place that we wanted to visit, as we started doing repair jobs on the cottage for the owners when we visited, and left small items behind in storage in the spare room. We travelled back there more often than the owners themselves, who had become friends, and laughed every time we rang them up to enquire if the cottage was being used at all that month!

Dave and I had been holidaying in our adopted holiday home for several years when suddenly the defining day arrived. We sat in the sunshine in the square at Ferragudo, looked around and both said to each other at the same time,

“I could live here.”

I think until that point it had probably been just a silently voiced ‘one day’ distant dream for both of us, however, once we had said it out loud and agreed with each other; suddenly it became one of those ‘well, why not?’ ideas that refused to disappear.

It wasn’t long before we were house-hunting and purchased a modern property on the edge of the village. We still had the slight problem of working back in the UK, but we spent every spare minute we could in our new home in Ferragudo. Finally, after five more years, Dave retired from the police, I handed in my notice (a scary moment!); we packed up the car and moved to live in the Algarve.

Our new life in the sun could begin.

We warn people when they come to stay at our house now to beware the Portuguese magic that bewitches you and attacks all your senses—you may never be the same again. When you wander down into the local village, sit and have a coffee and relax, as you watch the world go by with the warm sun on your face; or the first time you glimpse the blue shimmering sea from the top of the steps that lead down to the beach—those are the moments that get your heart racing and your mind wandering into the ‘what if we lived here?’ thoughts that can change forever your perspective on life.

So what makes Portugal so special? Certainly the weather is a big factor, and long summer days of uninterrupted sunshine help enormously, although we know it is not all sun—boy, can it rain here too. And if we are honest, sometimes those long hot summers can even be too hot, as we sit in the shade with the locals and reminisce about the cooler autumn days.

The weather is gorgeous here all year round really, with an average temperature well over thirty degrees in the summer, and over three hundred reported days of sun a year. It is an easy place to market and promote when it comes to the sunshine factor.

But it is so much more than the sun and the weather, as anyone spending any length of time here discovers.

There is a sense that the seasons, the land and traditional farming methods, and the church calendar still give this country its rhythm and pattern. People often say this is what England was like fifty years ago, and there is a feeling of timelessness about this part of the world as soon as you step away from the beach-front tourist areas.

It is not just the place though; it is also the local people. Throughout the region there are gentle, kind, welcoming Portuguese people, whose lives seem to march to a different pace of life; they make time to sit in the sun; greet their friends, and reflect an era long passed away in many other countries. They are polite, reserved, proud of their culture and heritage, and always willing to help you.

There is a different, gentler pace of life here, with the passing of time measured by the local church bells that ring every hour, followed by another church in the distance which chimes away three minutes later. Nobody seems to mind.

And when you are walking along a deserted beach in November watching the sunset, and feeling the sense of calm and peace that only the luxury of free time can give you, with the waves rhythmically and gently curling along the edge of the sand, then you know you have made the right choice and you are exactly where you need to be.

One of the other great things about living here in the Algarve is being able to sit outside in the sunshine and enjoy a leisurely meal in a pretty restaurant, savouring good quality, tasty food.

We really love finding local restaurants, enjoying simple traditional food, surrounded by Portuguese people, where we can still get change from thirty euros for a meal for two.

Prato do dia (which literally translates as ‘plate of the day’) is very common out here, especially at lunchtime, and if you know where to go, you can have a three-course meal, with a drink and a coffee afterwards for nine euros each. Often there are three or four main dishes to choose from, usually local meat, or fish, and sometimes there is a vegetarian option.

Another food that is very common here is the local favourite of Piri-piri chicken, accompanied by chips and a side salad, and washed down rather nicely with a small beer or two.

——-

We had always joked we were ‘too young to retire’ and we both had made plans. I had the burning ambition to do two things—to paint and write—and Dave had held a camera in his hands since he was a young boy. We had dreams of transforming our hobbies into something more concrete and professional once we moved out here to live permanently. We did not know if our plans would be successful, but at the very worst, they would keep us busy and out of mischief, and give our days some purpose and opportunity.

We forged our new careers, although neither of us had ever worked for ourselves before, or had any idea what we were doing! We just knew what we loved, and we figured the rest out as we went along. Our first joint exhibition in the Holiday Inn hotel was a scary moment! They gave us a fabulous room to use and loads of support—but said that we couldn’t hang anything on the walls! We improvised, Dave created a set of table-top A-frame easels, and we were all set.

I will never forget our first morning opening up, wondering if anyone would come, if they would like our work, or buy anything. Within half-an-hour, we had both sold our first pieces, and we were away. We fashioned our own little ‘happy dance’ which we jigged around to after each sale. We usually waited until the customer had departed, although I think a few clients might have caught a snatch of our happy little jig!

Almost ten years later, I consider myself an established artist, having sold more than two hundred paintings, and completed over one hundred commissions for clients around the world. Dave is now a well-respected and busy photographer, always happiest getting his feet wet on a deserted beach with his camera and tripod at hand. I am lucky enough to sell paintings almost before they have dried on the easel, which sadly means I do not have the inventory or body of new work needed to host and run our own exhibitions anymore. I do miss the excitement of those pop-up events.

It still humbles me to know that people love my work. Dave even photographed a house one day with the rental agent present and spotted one of my paintings on the wall in the lounge. That was a rather surreal moment for him, as the agent said she loved the painting, and Dave was able to tell her that his wife had painted it!

My attempts to learn the language have met with differing degrees of success. After many years of struggling and suffering, I can now hold a basic conversation with local people and—mostly—understand what is being said to me. I can usually respond with something vaguely articulate, if not always grammatically correct. There are, however, odd words that I just seem to get stuck on, no matter how many times I hear them, or think I know what they mean. Take doente for example. Every time I hear this word, I immediately think it means ‘dead’. I learnt the hard way…

One of our local elderly neighbours walked past me one day. He always stops to chat, he is a dear old soul and after the usual niceties; he said to me,

“Minha esposa está doente.”

My daft brain translated that to mean, “my wife is dead”.

“Oh no, I am so sorry, that is terrible,” I replied in my best Portuguese. Before I could muster together the phrase for ‘I’m sorry for your loss’, or offer him my condolences, he spluttered,

“Pah! It is nothing!”

I must have looked as surprised and horrified as I felt, because he looked at me incredulously and said,

“It is nothing, just a cold. She will be fine again in a few days.”

Note to self: doente means sick—not dead.

——-

Our life here in the Algarve has been more than we could have ever imagined. I look back on that day, now ten years ago, when I handed in my notice from work with some trepidation, and started the job of packing to move out here to live. Those first few months of settling into our new home, navigating the bureaucracy and differences, exploring and delighting in every new beach and village we discovered, and the wonderful friends we made, all helped us to feel happy and settled very quickly. We have since moved to live in the western Algarve, in a small town near the ocean, and we are blissfully happy here.

Our creative endeavours, beautiful home, relaxed way of life, and my daily walks beside the river with Kat the dog are all things that bring joy to my soul. I have never regretted our decision to move here, and every year I feel more content and delighted to call the Algarve our home.

I am truly grateful to be ‘living our dream’.

Alyson has written three travel memoir books in her Algarve Dream Series. Find out more about the Algarve and Alyson’s paintings and books on her website:

www.alysonsheldrake.com

During his first visit to rural Ireland, bestselling author Nick Albert discovered the road to his Shangri-La wouldn’t be easy to find.

I recently saw a piece on the news regarding the successful delivery of a parcel to a house in rural Ireland, despite the address on the label being totally unreadable. The world was agog, social media heaved with chatter, and the press were overawed. But the mystery of how the parcel reached the correct destination received no more than a nonchalant shoulder shrug in Ireland. Because of the intrepid staff at the Irish postal service, An Post, and their encyclopaedic knowledge of their delivery areas, such miracles are almost commonplace here. 

My wife Lesley and I had always had a yearning to leave the noise, stress and pollution of modern Britain behind and move to the countryside, where the living is good, the air sweet, and there is space for our dogs to run free. But our idea would have remained just a dream, had circumstances not forced our hands. Suddenly out of work and soon to be homeless, we set off in search of a new life in Ireland, a country they had never before visited. After much research on the interweb thingy, we chose County Clare, in the rural west of Ireland, and began hunting for our dream home. Bereft of local knowledge and without a Satnav in our hire-car, we quickly discovered the only way to navigate rural County Clare was with an Ordnance Survey map, a compass, a magnifying glass, and some kindly guidance from the local village shops. We never failed to find our destination during that month-long search for our Shangri-La, although sometimes the journey took rather a long time.

The Ordnance Survey map of County Clare is covered with a mind-blowing mass of little squiggly lines, almost like a Victorian maze or the trails of a hundred drunk spiders. On closer inspection, we realized we were looking at a representation of the rural road network. At the bottom of each page was a key, providing helpful clues to the meaning of each line and symbol.

Only a few roads travelled across the map with any sign of confident purpose, and these major roads were colouredred and given numbers. However, when we visited these roads, they didn’t look like a major thoroughfare or display any identifying numbers. More numerous than the red roads on the map were yellow ones. These jolly lines travelled in all directions, like a spilt spaghetti, occasionally connecting two red lines for no apparent reason. Whereas the red lines indicated A-class regional roads, the yellow lines represented B-roads. They were usually around four metreswide, or even less, and resisted all attempts at identification. Lesley and I soon decided the ‘B’ stood for “Bloody hell, we’re lost again!” Branching off from the B-roads were hundreds of grey lines that the map key called ‘other roads’. More apt descriptions were barely passable, impassable, or non-existent. These grey lines were usually subdivided, sometimes several times, into branch roads, each becoming ever more difficult to find and navigate. Inevitably, most of the properties we had selected to view were hidden at the end of one of these branches.

Undaunted and enchanted, we persisted in our search until we found Glenmadrie, a rundown former goat farm, on a few scrubby acres, high in the beautiful hill of East Clare. Out of work and soon to be homeless, we set about If finding our dream house was difficult, buying it seemed almost impossible. How would they cope with banks that didn’t want customers, builders who didn’t need work, or the complex issue of where to buy some chickens?

Upon taking ownership of Glenmadrie, our first task was to visit our local post office and announce our presence. Since then, we have always received our post, even when it was only addressed to: Lesley, Clare, Ireland. That being said, international parcels can be somewhat trickier.

Despite our close ties with America and the UK, many online retailers still consider Ireland an unsuitable destination for their products, even though they seem happy to ship to nefarious third-world countries and war zones. A small proportion of parcels never reach Ireland, heading instead for far-flung places like Australia, Israel, or France, with all the enthusiasm of a drunk homing pigeon. Such confusion is understandable. After all, depending on how the mood takes you, Ireland can be referred to as Southern Ireland, Ireland, Eire, The Republic of Ireland, or just ROI. The tracking data for those parcels which do arrive usually has just three entries:

1. Your package has been dispatched.
2. We have no idea where your package is…
3. Your package has been delivered!

Rumour has it there is a Bermuda triangle for courier drivers, somewhere in the green and hilly wilds of County Clare. Somewhere amongst the tangle of leafy lanes, unsignposted junctions and mobile phone blind spots, there must be a pub called, The Backend of Beyond. I imagine it is a welcoming place, with a warm fire, good beer, friendly staff, and a car park bursting with hundreds of abandoned delivery vans.

Because of the high turnover of courier drivers, we seldom see the same person twice. I have spent many happy hours on the phone trying to direct a delivery driver to our house. At times I felt like an air traffic controller guiding a crippled aircraft safely towards a landing. Although we now have a carefully developed series of instructions with easily identifiable waypoints, sometimes it’s just quicker to drive to the local post office and wait for the courier to arrive.

One quirk of rural Ireland, which first endeared us to this beautiful place, was the lack of postal codes. For many years, we struggled to explain this omission to any company with a computer or an online booking form. The technology simply couldn’t cope with the blank postcode box and refused to complete the transaction. The residents of rural Ireland proudly wore this affront like a badge of honour until the day we heard the shocking news – Ireland was going to get postal codes.

In most civilized countries, to help those good people at the post office deliver our letters and parcels, it is common practice to use a zipcode or some other style of postal code designed for the country in question. Zipcodes and postal codes are ubiquitous. Germany introduced them in 1941 at the height of World War Two. Argentina introduced them in 1958, the UK in 1959, and the USA in 1963. By 2015, almost every country on the planet was using some sort of zipcode except Ireland. There were a few good reasons for this delay:

1. Frankly, as a nation, we’re pretty resistant to newfangled ideas. Although, it can become quite tedious, explaining how we manage to get around and make a living, despite being so cruelly disadvantaged.
2. We’ve been finding each other’s houses for centuries, without the need for digitized codes. When you move in, you simply inform the local postmaster where you live. They will then say something like, “Oh, you mean Bill’s old place?” and that will become the moniker for your residence, even though Bill was chronologically only the third in a long line of owners, but evidently first in regard to notoriety.
3. We quite like the rebelliousness of entering a string of zeros into the postcode box of online forms and being able to tell foreigners that we don’t have, or need, postcodes.

Postal codes are really simple. They are just a code for an address in reverse. For example, take the English postcode CM7 3DT. The UK has 121 postal areas. CM is the code for the district of Chelmsford, and 7 is the sub-code for the town of Braintree. The number 3 directs postmen and delivery drivers to the southeast of the town, and DT takes them to Howard Close. So, a letter addressed to: 201, CM7 3DT, UK, would easily reach 201, Howard Close, Braintree, Essex, England, United Kingdom – if there were such an address. Each element of the postcode is a unique but logical identifier for part of the eventual destination. It’s so simple an idea that you couldn’t cock it up if you tried. Or could you?

In 2005, the Irish government announced they were going to design a unique postal code system named Eircode. Not for them the stuffy system used by those tricky Brits, the tried-and-tested German structure, the logical American Zip codes, or even something based on the newfangled GPS system. Ten years and €27-million later, having roundly ignored advice from all sides, the new Eircode system was unveiled, and the good people of Ireland gave a collective snort of disbelief and said, “Well, that’s never going to work!”

I recall a discussion I had with Brian, a friend who happens to be a retired postman.

“Are these Eircodes really just random letters and numbers, or is there some system being applied?” I asked.

“No. The lettering is deliberately haphazard,” he replied, smiling over his beer. “They couldn’t risk delivery drivers using the Eircodes without paying for them. So, each city was allocated an arbitrary letter, which appears at the beginning of the Eircode. These letters bear no relationship to the city name. For example, Galway is H, Cork city is T, and P and E. Tipperary will be designated E, but an F is for North Roscommon and Sligo. County Clare, Limerick, and parts of Kerry will use a V. The second part of the Eircode is randomly generated, meaning it is impossible to identify two linked addresses, even if they share a dividing wall.”

“It sounds fantastically complicated,” I laughed. “Perhaps it’s like a Mensa question. If Waterford is X, County Laois is R, and Ennis is V, how many apples has Sally got?”

Brian snorted into his beer.

“Did every house get an Eircode?” I asked.

“Well, every property in Ireland was allocated an Eircode. If someone didn’t get one, it was because Eircode didn’t know their house existed, or because they thought the house was in a different field, or because they made a mistake.”

“And how are these mistakes to be rectified?”

“Why do you ask?” His eyes narrowed.

“There’s a special website set up to help people check their Eircodes,” I explained. “According to the map, my Eircode will send people to a muddy farm track up by the forest.”

He pulled a face before answering, as if he were trying to suck something from between his front teeth.

“If your address was inadvertently changed during the issuing of Eircodes, there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. My advice is to order some new stationery, change the sign on your house, inform all of your friends, and get over it.” Brian smiled benevolently and sipped his beer.

Not to worry! Our post (devoid of an Eircode) still finds its way to our house, even when it is addressed to our old house in England, but with the useful footnote, County Clare, Ireland. If you want to send a letter to Ireland, you can try adding an Eircode – it might work. Or, you can deliver it by hand. Everyone here would be pleased to see you. Alternatively, address your letters like this: “Your man Henderson, that boy with the glasses who is doing the PhD up here at Queen’s in Belfast; Buncrana, County Donegal, Ireland.”

Honestly, you couldn’t make it up!

Nick Albert is the author of the bestselling memoir series, Fresh Eggs and Dog Beds. Published by Ant Press, it’s the comical tale of an English couple and their unruly dogs, searching for a better life in rural Ireland.

www.nickalbertauthor.com

Excerpt from The Coconut Wireless: A Travel Adventure in Search of the Queen of Tonga by Simon Michael Prior

The dive boat puttered gently away from the wharf, Jan at the wheel staring dead ahead, his mouth in a straight line. I had set myself a private challenge to make him laugh today, but his mood was as serious as an undertaker in an epidemic.

“This place drives me mad,” he said. “I give a Tongan man a job as my gardener, and he steals my coconuts.”

“Maybe he really needs them?” I said, “I think some people here have hardly any food.”

“The problem is,” said Jan, “the Tongans don’t have a concept of ownership. Historically, all possessions are communal. An excellent theory, in that everyone gets looked after by their families and nobody goes without essentials, not so great if people help themselves to stuff you consider to be yours.”

“It must have been hard adjusting to life here as a European.”

“I’m not a rich man. I have my boat, and my car, and little else. I don’t even own the house we live in. But my wife’s family believe I’m an incredibly wealthy palangi (white man), and I should support all of them. I mean, I’m happy to help with money they need for essential medical care. But the other day, my mother-in-law wanted me to pay to have her legs waxed. She’s never had them waxed before in her life; it was something she’d seen in a magazine. Because I’m a ‘rich westerner’, she thinks I can give her unlimited funds for that sort of thing.”

I understood why Jan’s mood was morose.

I needed to change the subject.

“Jan, where are we diving today?”

He brightened.

“Today, Simon, we’re going to do four dives. I’ll give you free diving today, because I’ve seen you’re competent, and I need a bit of help.”

Wow, free diving.

“Of course, Jan. What do you need me to do?”

“Yesterday, I had a phone call from Fafa Island Resort, a short distance off the coast here. They want us to collect two of their guests who are going to dive with us. I think they’re not experienced, so we’ll all dive together. I’ll lead the dives, and you can follow at the rear to make sure nobody gets left behind. Afterwards we’ll drop them back and have some lunch. I brought some fruit to eat. This afternoon we’ve a similar job. I’ll tell you about it later.”

I loved that he referred to it as a job. I was going to be working as a dive professional on a tropical island. 

“It’s about three kilometres to Fafa Island. While I’m steering, could you please assemble our guests’ dive gear? I think you know how to do that.”

I gathered the various components we’d need.

Jan increased speed as we left the wharf, while I balanced on the rear deck, shifting from one bare foot to the other with the motion of the boat, gazing at the tropical sea, sun on my back, assembling tanks and buoyancy devices. If a competition for ‘most content marine employee’ existed, I would be on the podium.

After a few minutes, the tone of the engine changed. We couldn’t be there already. What was wrong? I looked forward through the wheelhouse. An open boat was approaching us, with three people in it. The man standing at the wheel was waving at us with his entire arm.

“What’s up with them, Jan? Do they need help?”

“It’s the boat from Fafa Island. Let’s see what they want.”

We motored slowly over to them until we were alongside.

Jan greeted the driver. “Hi Alan, everything okay?” 

It’s so cool how all the people working in the tourist industry here know each other.

“Hi, Jan. I’ve brought your customers to you. I was heading into town, so I thought we’d meet halfway.”

Two men sat in the boat’s bow. One had a closely cropped beard, and they both had Mediterranean sunburnt skin. Jan invited them to step over into our boat. I helped them board.

“Hi guys, I’m Jan, your instructor, and this is Simon, who’s working with me today.”

I felt proud to be introduced as his assistant. 

I can’t let them know this is my first day on the job. 

The man with the beard spoke.

“Hello. I’m Pedro. This is my brother, Hesoos.”

“Which country are you from?” I asked.

“From Spain. We’re travelling round the world and we’re here a few days. It’s beautiful here, no people. Not like Spain.”

I agreed it wasn’t like Spain.

Jan pulled out a clipboard and gave it to me.

“Simon, please ask our guests to fill out their details on this dive log. Name, address, and the rest. I’ll start driving.”

I gave the clipboard to Pedro. He filled in his details and passed the form to his brother.

Hesoos wrote, and returned the completed document to me.

I scanned it.

His name wasn’t Hesoos.

It was Jesus.

Pronounced ‘Hesoos’.

My first ever day working in the industry, and I was going to be diving with Jesus. 

Our first dive site was a sunken freighter off Makaha island, close to where Jan had shown me the organ coral. Jan anchored, and we all donned our dive gear. Jesus helped Pedro, instructing him in rapid Spanish where he should put his arms. 

Jan addressed the brothers. “I’ll enter the water first, and you both please follow me. Stay close to me and to each other. Simon will swim behind. If you have any problem, Simon or I will help you.”

Who’ll help me if I have a problem?

I dismissed this thought, as I was now a highly experienced dive professional.

Jan jumped into the water, and Pedro, Jesus and I followed. They both seemed to know the basics, which was a relief. I didn’t want to be putting my rescue diver training into practice if I could help it.

Jan pointed into the water. “If you look down, you can see the wreck. It’s shallow here; we can stay underwater a long time. Everybody ready? Let’s go.” 

Jan gave the ‘thumbs down’ signal, indicating we should descend.

We submerged, and Pedro plummeted to the sea floor. 

Oh great, day one at work and I’ve killed my first customer.

Pedro sat on the ocean floor surrounded by a cloud of sand, his hands flailing around as he tried to steady himself and operate his equipment. I helped him inflate his buoyancy device, and he floated just above the bottom. I gripped his tank valve to keep him near to me and prevent a reoccurrence. Once Jan and Jesus had appeared, Jan gave the okay sign, I responded, and we followed them as they swam.

All was silent in the underwater world. Pedro drifted beside me, more relaxed.

The wreck loomed ahead of us, a foreign invader in these pristine waters. She lay on her side, murky brown and green, shoals of fish surrounding her. Large fish swam past, with smaller accomplices hitching a ride in their slipstream. A stingray hovered underneath us, and settled, burying itself in the sand.

Jan pointed at the entrance to the wreck and wagged his finger left and right. The implication was clear: ‘do not enter’. We circled the wreck, our slow approach making fish hide in the portholes. We looked in, and they scattered.

Pedro showed me his air gauge. One third remaining. It was time to return to the boat. I gave Jan the ‘thumbs-up’ sign, meaning time to swim to the surface. We swam diagonally upwards, following Jan. I helped Pedro slow his ascent. I didn’t want him to get the bends, a serious condition divers suffer from, caused by ascending too fast. I knew the nearest working decompression chamber was in Fiji. The one in Tonga was broken, like much of the infrastructure here.

We surfaced a few metres from the boat and took our air regulators out of our mouths.

“How was that?” Jan asked the Spaniards.

“Amazing, I’ve never seen anything like it.” Pedro spoke some rapid Spanish with Jesus, who nodded.

We boarded the boat and Jan started the engine. I heard the anchor chain clanking up.

“Now we’ll go to Pangimotu Island. Simon, could you please change all the tanks?”

Changing four people’s tanks was hard work. I didn’t care, I pretended I was an expert marine employee who’d been working on dive boats all my life.

We dropped anchor near Pangimotu island. Nuku’alofa shimmered in the haze off the starboard side.

“Here we’re going to dive a wreck that sank in the 1982 hurricane,” said Jan.

Tonga specialised in sunken boats. 

Pedro managed better on this dive, and it was more relaxing for me.

We returned the Spaniards to Fafa Island and anchored a short distance offshore.

Sparkling turquoise sea extended to the horizon, as three flying fish ploooped nearby.

“What’s the plan for this afternoon, skipper?” I asked.

“First, we’ll have some lunch. Then I’ve a real treat for you.”

Jan produced a container full of tropical fruit, which we ate while he talked.

“We’re going to collect our next customers from Royal Sunset Island Resort, on Atata Island, a long way further out to sea. They’re an American couple. I dived with them yesterday; they know what they’re doing. You won’t need me to lead the dives. I’ll stay on the boat, and you can be in charge.”

In charge.

Me.

Leading the dives.

I tried not to show how anxious I was about this.

“They want to swim with sharks, so we’ll take them to Hakaumama’o reef reserve. It’s twenty kilometres out to sea, the furthest reef away from Nuku’alofa. There are small reef sharks there.”

Great. My first ever experience leading dives for paying customers and I’m being thrown to the sharks.

“Jan, is there a knack to leading these dives? I mean, I haven’t dived this spot before, how will I know where to go? And how do you find the boat again so easily?”

“Great questions. Here’s the trick. The reef has several coral heads. I’ll tell you which direction to swim in once we anchor. Count the coral heads, and once you’ve used about one third of your air, turn round and come back again. Count the coral heads on the way back as you pass them, and you’ll be right under the boat.”

“Sounds good. What about the second dive?”

“That’s even easier. It’s on the other side of the reef, a two-minute boat ride from the first one. We’ll anchor in my usual spot; you drop down and follow the edge of the reef. Once you’ve about two-thirds of your air left, you turn round and follow the reef back again. You’ll be fine.”

I was proud Jan had trusted me to give his clients an enjoyable experience, and I didn’t want to disappoint him.

“Finished?” Jan packed the fruit away. “Can you please change the tanks while we drive to Atata Island?” 

At Royal Sunset Resort’s wharf, the Americans introduced themselves as Rick and Pamela. Rick carried a large underwater camera. He passed it to me as he stepped awkwardly over the edge of the boat, his tummy moulding itself to the rail. His steel grey hair swept up in a quiff, and his polo shirt displayed the logo Canyon Golf Club.

I reckoned Pamela wasn’t much older than me. She wore huge Prada sunglasses and had spent some time perfecting her bleached blonde hair and make-up, as if she were about to star in Dynasty. I found this odd as she was going underwater. They accepted Jan’s explanation I would lead the dives today without question. 

Wealthy, paying divers relying on me for a great holiday experience.

I hope my nerves don’t show. I hope I don’t make any mistakes.

To give the impression that I knew what I was doing, I untied the ropes and coiled them neatly, while Jan pulled away from the dock. 

We sped up, heading for the open sea, and I struck a pose as if I worked on a dive boat every day of my life. The American couple talked to each other and not to me. I realised there was an unseen barrier between the paying customers and the staff.

Nuku’alofa was distant on one horizon, and out to sea nothing was visible but water. We anchored at the outer reef. I looked over the side and could see the first coral head. 

Rick helped Pamela with her gear, and they refused my offer of assistance. I was becoming more nervous.

What if something happens? 

I had visions of a Stetson-clad Texan prosecutor pacing up and down in a Houston court, asking me where I was at the time in question.

Jan called me in to the wheelhouse. “It’s important when you’re leading a dive to enter the water before your customers. Then if one of them has a problem, you’re in the water and you can help. I think they’re ready, you’d better kit up.”

I rushed to put my familiar gear on, and with my hand holding my mask to my face, I tumbled backwards over the side. Rick and Pamela followed me, and we gathered at the surface. 

“Everybody ready?” I asked.

Jan called from the boat. “Just a minute, Simon.” He beckoned me over. “I think you might need this.” 

He handed me my weight belt and laughed. “You won’t sink very far down without it.”

Embarrassed, I took the weight belt and put it on. As I swam back to the other two divers, he chuckled behind me. I had achieved my goal of making him laugh, not in quite the way I had intended.

Thank goodness Rick and Pamela hadn’t seen.

My ‘thumbs down’ signal invited them to descend close to the first coral head.

I led the way.

One coral head. Two coral heads. 

Little white-tipped reef sharks swam around us, and Rick took several pictures. 

Three coral heads.

A colossal fish, bigger than the sharks, swam into view. Rick photographed Pamela with the giant fish in the background and turned to me, making the okay sign. Even though his air regulator hid his mouth, I could see from his eyes he was smiling. I relaxed. 

Dive leading’s easy, I’m enjoying this.

We reached the fourth coral head.

I checked my air. Two-thirds left. Time to return.

Rick had his camera close to the coral head and his flash reflected from underneath it. Fish would be hiding there, and I guessed he’d discovered something good to photograph. I turned round to find Pamela.

Something was wrong.

Her air regulator wasn’t in her mouth. She had no air.

Oh shit.

***

I swam over to Pamela as fast as I could. She scooped her right arm behind her, trying to find the hose that connected her air regulator to her tank, and her eyes were wide and panicked.

Help! What do I do?

Her air regulator dangled just out of her reach. I grabbed it and shoved it into her mouth, pushing with my flat hand against it. My rescue diver training had taught me alarmed divers sometimes spit their regulator out in their terror. I made a slow hand movement repeatedly up to my mouth and then away again, meaning breathe slowly. She calmed down as she discovered she had air again. A few seconds later, her eyes returned to normal, and she began to look at me, not through me. I made the closed thumb and forefinger signal; are you okay? She showed the same sign back to me; I’m okay.

We swam together towards Rick. He was still snapping pictures, unaware of what had happened. I made a sign to him to indicate we were returning to the boat.

I kept close to Pamela.

Four coral heads, three, two, one, and the bottom of the boat appeared above us. I gave the ‘thumbs-up’ sign, and we ascended, surfacing a few metres away from the ladder.

“That was grand,” said Rick. “The giant wrasse, the sharks. I think I took some great photos. You should have seen that lobster under the coral head.”

“Rick, I nearly goddamned drowned,” said Pamela, sounding most unlike a Dynasty actress. “If it wasn’t for Simon, I’d be dead.”

“What the hell happened?” Rick turned to me as if I were responsible.

“It’s not Simon’s fault,” said Pamela. “You always tell me to take my regulator out so you can see my smile in the photos. I’m not doing that ever again. I dropped my regulator; couldn’t find it again, and you went off like a jerk with your stupid camera, and left me.”

Her expression changed from anger to a smile. “Thank you so much Simon. I’m so glad you knew what to do.”

Rick looked annoyed. He wasn’t used to being addressed in this fashion in front of the hired hand.

“Where’s the next dive?” he asked, changing the subject.

“On the other side of the reef, a two-minute boat ride,” I said, as if I had been there several times this week already.

We climbed back on board, and the expert deckhand, dive leader and now lifesaver changed the tanks again for his adoring clientele.

I remembered Jan’s advice about the second dive and led Rick and Pamela along the reef. The sound like crinkling cellophane reminded me to search for the parrot fish, who made this noise as they tore weed off the rocks.

Rick took multiple pictures of the various coral formations. His flash lit up in my peripheral vision, while I kept a careful eye on Pamela.

We finished the dive and returned the Americans to Atata island. 

“Simon, you’ve just been tremendous,” said Pamela, as I helped her off the boat.

She held my hand a little too long, making sure Rick was noticing. She mounted her sunglasses on her nose, and strode off up the jetty, without waiting for her husband.

Rick took his wallet out of his pocket. He looked down at the floor, and then up at me. “Thank you for what you did back there. And thanks for leading the dives. Here, something for you.”

He placed a note in my hand and followed Pamela into the resort.

I opened my palm.

“Jan, he gave me fifty pa’anga.”

“The Americans tip well, don’t they? You’ve earned it, dive leader.” 

Fifty pa’anga was only twenty-five pounds, but I felt prouder of today’s salary than any wages I had earned in an office.

If you’d like to read more, this excerpt comes from The Coconut Wireless: A Travel Adventure in Search of the Queen of Tonga by Simon Michael Prior.

A few letters from Dear Fran, Love Dulcie: Life and Death in the Hills and Hollows of Bygone Australia, Victoria Twead’s latest release.

9th May 1969

Dear Fran,

For the first time in months I have a few minutes spare. First of all have I thanked you for the Christmas parcel? What manners I have! Also Terry’s birthday card and mine. And anything else I’ve neglected to thank you for. 

We are terribly overworked here. I thought we worked hard before but now we do twenty hours a day. All the western half of Queensland is still drought-stricken and the State Government has ruled that any grazier with grass land must take the cattle from drought areas. Three hundred head of cattle were brought to us and we are forced to care for them until the owners are able to take them back after rain. 

They were brought here at the end of November last and look like being here for another year at least. Together, with our more than 400, it makes hard work for Len and myself. The government pays us $120 per week for keeping them. The big Army training area at Shoalwater Bay near us is also being used to feed stock. There are 44,000 head of cattle there at the moment. Being a tick-free area the men there haven’t much work to do though. 

Sure messes things up. We have done fifteen miles of fencing since December and put in three dams and one bore for extra water. All this at our own expense to house other folks’ cattle. For their sake and ours I hope rain falls in the west before too long. 

Had a broken foot and two toes in February. A bull jumped the gate, knocked me over and jumped on my foot. A half-ton [508 kg] bull sure is heavy! Slowed me down for a few weeks but is okay now. 

Terry had his share of trouble too. His horse tripped and fell and Terry got a few nasty scratches and bruises. He didn’t think to check his horse for injuries and remounted the poor thing. He came galloping up behind some wild steers and the horse went down again. Len gave Terry a sound scolding for riding an injured horse and packed Terry and the horse off home, both limping. They are both recovered now, thank heavens. 

We had an outing last weekend, the first time we’ve been out since Christmas. A friend’s son celebrated his 21st birthday. Was a wonderful party and we really enjoyed ourselves even though it was hard to get out of bed next morning. 

Well, Fran, I must catch the mail transport with this letter so excuse the shortness and write soon. I love getting your letters and wish I could manage to write to you more often. 

Love from,

Dulcie 

23rd August 1969

Dear Fran,

Winter appears to have left us, thank heavens, and the days and nights are becoming lovely again. We still have all the cattle on drought relief with no sign of rain for the western areas. 

Len, Terry and Len’s father went out through the drought areas last week and spent a couple of days digging for sapphires on the gem fields. Terry found one and is quite pleased with himself. It’s back to school again tomorrow after 2 weeks mid-term vacation. 

Remember me telling you about the little kitten Terry brought home last year, Fran? Somewhere along the way his name got changed to “Sugarplum” and he is now a full grown cat. Just now he brought his “catch” in to show me and as a result there are feathers all over the room. He loves me to admire him when he has caught something. One night he brought in a possum – still alive – and let it go on the bed. 

Len is putting down a bore for more water. It is 58 feet deep [17.7 metres] and seems to have quite a good supply although it is rather salty, 360 grams to the gallon. Still it should be good for cattle. 

Well, Fran, like time, news is scarce so have a happy birthday, do something nice to celebrate and write and tell me about it. 

Love,

Dulcie

27th November 1969 

Dear Fran,

I’ve been thinking of you so much since I received your last letter. Somehow, I feel that something is wrong. You don’t seem to be your usual cheerful self. I hope it’s nothing wrong in the family, Fran. If it is just the winter getting you down, come over and share our summer. It’s only just started but the temps have been over 100 [38ºC] for days now. 

Len and I have been felling timber – Len carrying a chainsaw about all day – but the heat has reduced me to an axe. Even that is hard enough to swing all day. Had quite a good storm 2 days ago which yielded 160 points of rain. [One point is 0.254 mm or 0.01 inches.] Much needed too as the feed quickly burns off in the heat. Our drought cattle are still with us and look as if they are here to stay. Two Brahman cows died calving last week and I have the calves here to feed. I start them off sucking my finger in a bucket of milk until they learn to drink. One feeds quite good but the other bites. 

Posted off a Christmas parcel for you last week. So hard to find anything unusual. The little koala for you is made of kangaroo skin, the kind known as Blue, hence the blue fur. Terry selected the ’roo skin caps for the boys and Dick. The large colourful map you might like to hang in the basement. Len suggested the Australian beer, etc. for Dick to celebrate with. Hope you have a good time! 

My eldest brother Tom was married on 25th October, his 35th birthday. His bride looked so nice. A small girl always does, I think. Me and my skinny 5 feet 6 inches [168 cm], I look and sometimes feel ungainly! 

Terry is doing his final year exam this week and starts 6 weeks holidays on 14th December. He is now a member of the Yeppoon Swimming Club and hopes one day to take my title from me which I still hold for the 100 metres overarm. The club meets every Wednesday night for competitive racing and although it’s tiring, I enjoy the cool off. 

Well, Fran, I’ve guests to dinner tonight and although I finished work early to come home and prepare I’m afraid I’ve not even started yet, so I guess I’d better think seriously now as it is nearly 6 o’clock. 

Trusting all is well with you and your family. 

Love,

Dulcie 

5th February 1970

Dear Fran,

What fun we had opening the parcel you sent. It arrived Christmas Eve while visitors were here. The space food was sampled by everyone and is delicious. Since school started, Terry’s “Space Pen” has been quite an item of interest. Thank you very much, Fran, and I trust you enjoyed unpacking yours as much as we did. 

We are having rather a wet year. Just what the drought-stricken west wanted. Since New Year’s Day we’ve had 43 inches [110 cm] of rain. We wanted the assistment [also agistment] cattle off the place and ordered the semi-trailers. What a time! 

The big semis would not go the last ½ mile to the yards and we had to truck the cattle 10 at a time in the small truck and back onto the semis until they were loaded. Took us 3 days in rain and mud to load the 400. Anyway they are all gone and there’s just our own stock to care for now. 

Len went up to St. Lawrence last week to see my brother. Rain has poured down ever since and Len is unable to get home. The road report on the radio last night stated one bridge was 22 feet [6.7 metres] under water, and still rising 3 inches [7.5 cm] an hour, and it’s still raining! Terry and I were going with him for the day but at the last minute I had a phone call to go to Rockhampton. 

Aren’t we glad now that we didn’t go. One day turned into 2 weeks. Anyway he is okay and there’s nothing he could do if he was home. I shifted the horses to higher ground yesterday and opened the gates on two extra paddocks for the cattle to get onto the hilly country and that is about all that can be done for a while. 

Dad and I are going to cross the bridge in the tractor today to get food and mail over before it rises too high. Needless to say Terry is enjoying the fact that the school bus can’t get over and so he has no school. The army helicopter still goes over every day so if there is any emergency we can always hang the flag up to bring him down. So we are not isolated really. 

Do you remember me mentioning Terry’s old collie dog at times, Fran? Poor old thing was 10 years old and for the past year she wasn’t too well. She died 3 weeks ago very quietly in her sleep. We miss her about the place. 

The working dogs, Queensland blue heelers, aren’t to be petted and played with so we haven’t any pet dog now. The old ginger cat who was about the same age died a few days ago too. The wet weather seemed to affect him and he had a cold. 

Well, Fran, I have a few letters to get ready before Dad comes, so I must away. 

Hope you are all well.

Love,

Dulcie

If you’d like to read more, this excerpt comes from Dear Fran, Love Dulcie: Life and Death in the Hills and Hollows of Bygone Australia compiled by Victoria Twead available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones, Powells, Booktopia, The Book Depository and all good bookstores.

When Dulcie Clarke picks up her fountain pen to write her first letter to her pen friend, Fran, she is unaware that their friendship will continue for decades. Both are newly-weds; Dulcie has a baby girl and Fran is expecting a baby. But there the similarities end.
Fran is a Detroit city girl enjoying modern conveniences. Dulcie is a pineapple farmer’s wife enduring the extremes of Australia. Bushfires, floods, cyclones, droughts, dingo attacks and accidents are all too common. Regardless, Dulcie’s optimism shines through, revealing her love of the land and fascination for the wild creatures that share her corner of Queensland.

Each book purchased will help support Careflight, an Australian aero-medical charity that attends emergencies, however remote.

“Shocking, yet heart-warming. Overwhelmingly gripping.” Beth Haslam, author of the Fat Dogs and French Estates series.

“Wow! Goosebumps.” Elizabeth Moore, author of the Someday Travels series and Top 1000 Amazon reviewer.

“A truly remarkable young woman and a unique record of Australian life.” Valerie Poore, author of Watery Ways

“Once read, never forgotten.” Victoria Twead, New York Times bestselling author of the Old Fools series.

“There are no words that can do this book justice.” Julie Haigh, Top 1000 Amazon reviewer.

An interview with Lisa Rose Wright for GoSpain magazine

The lure of Spain for generations of holidaymakers is obvious whether it’s sun, sea, culture or the ubiquitous sangria, but what about those foreigners who have decided to make Spain their home? What was it about the country which drew them here? How did they choose an area to live? What do they do here? Is there anything they miss? And what makes them stay or what makes them leave, Spain?

I’m Lisa Rose Wright, I live in beautiful green Galicia up in the top left corner of Spain and I write about the area. I can’t imagine living anywhere else. In this series I want to pose the question to other émigrés… Why Spain? 

My guest this month is Victoria Twead, New York Times best-selling author of the Two Old Fools series of memoirs.

Hi Victoria and welcome. So, Why Spain?

Hi Lisa! Good question! I’m a list-maker, and when I need to make a decision, I reach for pen and paper. I still have the list I wrote back in 2003. It seems rather out-dated now, but here it is. I then pitched it to my less-than-enthusiastic husband.

Sunny weather
Cheap houses
Live in the country
Ridiculously low council tax
Friendly people
Less crime     
No heating bills
Cheap petrol
Wonderful Spanish food
Cheap wine and beer
Much more laid-back life-style
Could afford house big enough for family and visitors to stay
No TV licence
Only short flight to UK
Might live longer because Mediterranean diet is healthiest in the world

I have to report that my husband’s response was not encouraging. He scribbled on the bottom of the note: CAN’T SPEAK SPANISH! TOO MANY FLIES! MOVING HOUSE IS THE PITS!

I ignored him, of course.

You lived in a tiny village in Andalucia. What drew you to that particular area and did you look at other areas before settling down?

We loved Spain already but wanted to live away from the tourist hot-spots. Much of the Almería region is still relatively unknown and unspoilt so it was the perfect choice for us.  

Did you look for work when you moved to Spain? What job(s) did you do?

In England, we renovated and sold houses to save enough money to move abroad. We bought our cottage in a tiny, mountain village and it had enough land to build a further two houses. Our days were occupied by stopping our own cottage from falling down and supervising the build of the two new houses. We kept chickens and suddenly had a thriving business on our hands supplying the village ladies with eggs. I began to write, and to our delight, the books became popular. So we were, in fact, self- employed, and still are. 

You wrote your first memoir, Chickens, Mules and Two Old Fools, before many of this type of travelogue memoir came out. What inspired you? 

Moving to Spain was undeniably a culture shock. Every new day produced events either hilarious or heart-warming. Food suddenly tasted better, human behaviour was more fascinating, local events more interesting. It was like seeing in colour for the first time, and the book began bubbling in my head.

Of course, Joe often lost patience with me, and rightly so. “Stop dreaming, and concentrate! Hold that ladder steady or I’m going to break a leg in a minute!” But the book was relentless. As soon as I could, I began to write. And to Joe’s horror, I’ve never stopped.

Was there anything you missed from home?

I can’t think of anything except in those early days, we couldn’t get English TV so I missed my soaps. Oh, and I also missed takeaway curries.

If you were moving now would you do anything different?

Yes, I would ensure that my teacher came from deepest, rural Andalucia. Why? Because the Andalucian accent is so strong that even people from northern Spain have trouble understanding the villagers. You can imagine how we struggled.

From your experiences, what one piece of advice would you give someone moving now?

Learn the language properly. You won’t just pick it up. Can I mention another one? Leave your British car behind and buy a Spanish one. The paperwork involved in keeping your British car is a nightmare.

The 65million dollar question…was Spain for life when you made the move or did you always plan to move on? Why?

I thought we would live in our village forever. I didn’t know that my daughter would meet a gorgeous Aussie boy, marry him and start producing grandchildren on the other side of the planet.

You now live in Australia. Is there anything you miss about living in Spain?

I loved living in Spain, but I also adore Australia. They both share the huge, open, blue skies and the friendly people. I guess I miss Spanish village life but I can now watch my grandchildren grow.  

GoSpain 2021

Discover what life was like working at a Dorset animal sanctuary. Gordon the Gannet became a permanent resident at the sanctuary, and here’s why…

Gordon, the gannet, (otherwise known as Thatbloodygreatbadtemperedseabird) was a big character at the sanctuary. Apart from an emu I met briefly many years later, Gordon was probably the most foul-tempered bird I have ever encountered. He had been found on a beach, exhausted, being tormented by a couple of dogs. A lady happened to be walking along the waterline and saw what was going on.

“Hey! Clear off!” she shouted at the dogs. “Leave that bird alone!”

The dogs ran off and she looked down at the bird. He didn’t look injured, but he couldn’t fly and she was determined not to desert him.

“Okay, bird,” she said, approaching Gordon. “I’m going to pick you up, put you in my car and take you to the vet for a check over.”

Gordon glared at her.

Before she could even reach down, Gordon’s razor-sharp beak slashed her hand.

“Okay, bird,” she said, mopping her bleeding hand with a handkerchief, “let’s do this another way.”

Gordon glared at her.

The lady unzipped her jacket and threw it over Gordon. Gordon squawked, but she managed to wrap him up and secure his wicked beak. She carried him to her car and took him straight to the local vet.

Luckily, there was no queue, and she and Gordon were admitted right away.

“Ah, so you’ve brought me some sort of seabird, have you?” asked the vet, staring at the webbed feet protruding from the jacket. “Just pop him on the table.”

“He’s got a very…”

Too late. As the vet tugged off the jacket, Gordon’s beak was free. He whipped it round and took a chunk out of the vet’s hand.

“…sharp beak,” finished the lady.

The vet called his nurse.

“Brenda, could you restrain this lady’s gannet please, while I attend to my cut hand and the gannet owner’s cut hand?”

He disinfected and bandaged both their wounds, then addressed himself to Gordon. Gordon’s beak was now taped shut but that didn’t stop him glaring balefully at all three of them.

“Oh, he’s a gannet is he?” asked the lady. “And he’s not mine, I just found him on the beach being barked at and tormented by a couple of dogs.”

“Did he try to fly?”

“No, not that I saw.”

The vet unfurled Gordon’s wings, one after the other, and examined each closely.

Gordon’s eyes narrowed in threat.

“Well, I can’t see anything wrong with his wings. Or the rest of him. I’d say he’s a young bird and he got caught in that storm last night. I think he’s exhausted. A good rest and feed and he’ll be as right as rain.”

“I can’t look after him,” said the lady. “I know nothing about gannets and I have to go to work. Can I leave him here?”

Gordon’s eyes became evil slits.

“I’m afraid we can’t take him either,” said the vet. “I suggest you drop him off at the animal sanctuary. Tell them he needs a rest and a feed, and I’m sure they’ll look after him then set him free in a few days when he’s got his strength back again.”

The lady very kindly did exactly that. She delivered Gordon to the animal sanctuary, and relayed what the vet had said.

“Be careful,” she warned. “His beak is lightning fast. He’s already drawn blood twice!” She pointed to her bandaged hand. “He got me and he got the vet, too.”

Gordon blinked malevolently.

“Well, I must be off. I’ll leave you to it,” she said, and left.

The Special Care unit manager, Simon, found a vacant pen with an empty pond which he reckoned would do nicely for Gordon’s short stay.

“This’ll do, Tony,” he said to his long-haired assistant. “I’ll pop out and buy some fish for him, and we’ll fill his pond up tomorrow. He should be good to release in a few days.”

Never work with children or animals; they’ll always surprise you.

Tony the Hippy was very careful and managed to release Gordon’s beak without mishap. He left Gordon glaring round his temporary pen and waited for Simon to return. Simon arrived back from the fishmonger with a selection of fish for Gordon.

“How’s Gordon been?” he asked.

“Cool, man, groovy.”

Tony quickly chopped up the fish.

“I’ll try him with this,” said Simon and entered the pen.

He dumped the fish onto the ground, watching Gordon’s reaction. Gordon peered at the mound of fish.

“I think he’s interested,” Simon said to Tony.

But Gordon wasn’t interested. Next morning the mound of fish was exactly as they’d left it, except it was crawling with flies and beginning to smell.

The worldwide web hadn’t yet been invented. In those days, if one wanted to research a subject, one had to go to the library, or buy a book about it, or ask an expert.

There wasn’t a library close to hand, or a bookshop. They didn’t know any gannet experts, so they did the next best thing, they phoned the vet.

“Could you tell us what gannets eat, please?”

“Hmm… Seawater fish, of course. I’m guessing mackerel and local species. Hasn’t he eaten anything?”

“Nothing.”

“Oh,” said the vet suddenly. “I’ve just remembered something from my student days. I believe you need to keep the fish whole, don’t cut them up. Did you chop them up?”

“Yes, we did.”

“Right, keep them whole in future, heads, tails, everything. Then grab the tail and waggle it like mad so that the bird thinks its alive. They’re not attracted to dead fish.”

“Oh! Right! We’ll try that then.”

“Take care, his beak is really sharp.”

“Don’t worry, he hasn’t tried anything with us yet.”

Simon was hopeful and shot out to buy some fresh, whole, local, fish. He returned with a bag full, their tails poking out of the top.

“Let’s see if this’ll tempt him,” said Simon. “Do you want to try, or shall I?”

“Hey, man, I’ll have a go,” said Tony the Hippy.

He grabbed a fish, let himself into Gordon’s pen and crouched down. Holding the fish firmly by the tail, he waggled it in Gordon’s direction. Gordon eyed him warily from the other side of the pen.

“He’s watching,” said Simon, “keep waggling!”

Gordon shrugged his shoulders, then started lumbering towards Tony and the fish, his webbed feet slapping the ground.

“Yes!” said Simon. “He’s interested! He’s coming over! Keep waggling the fish!”

Gordon was gathering momentum and moving faster now, heading for Tony and the fish, a gleam in his eye.

“Come on, man,” said Tony encouragingly. “You must be starving, come and take a big bite.”

Gordon reached the fish, stretched out his neck … and took a chunk out of Tony’s hand.

“Ow!” yelled Tony, jumping back with more energy than hippies usually display. “Listen, you bloody over-sized seagull, I was just trying to feed you!”

Tony needed first aid for the nasty cut that Gordon had inflicted.

“Hey,” he told me much later, holding out his hand for me to see. “I still have the scar.”

And Gordon still hadn’t been fed. Simon phoned the vet again and told him the latest developments.

“Looks like you’ll have to force feed him,” said the vet. “You’ll need to push the fish down his neck. About three or four good-sized fish. Every day.”

This wasn’t good news for the staff or Gordon, but it needed to be done. Simon and Tony worked out the best way to do it, and it was a two-man job requiring sturdy gloves.

This was the procedure:

• Using a board, herd Gordon into a corner of his pen.
• Grab Gordon’s neck with one hand, and his beak in the other.
• Kneel astride Gordon, to keep him still and his powerful wings folded, whilst still holding onto his beak. (Gannets have a wingspan of up to two metres, or six and a half feet.)
• Pull his beak open, pointing up, so that the fish will go straight down the neck.
• Ram the fish down Gordon’s throat.

Poor Gordon. It was a terribly undignified operation and can’t have been comfortable. However, it worked, and Gordon grew stronger, although his temper never improved.

Simon and Tony hoped that, when his pond was filled with water, Gordon might become more contented. They ran a hose into the pen and began to fill the pond. Gordon backed away to the far corner, glaring at the hose as though it was a vicious serpent. Even when the pond was filled to the brim and the hosepipe removed, he refused to come out of his corner.

“Hey man, what’s the matter with that dude now?” asked Tony. “I thought he’d go and have a paddle at least.”

But Gordon hated his pond and wouldn’t go near it.

The next surprise came the following day. Having been force-fed several fish, Gordon was squirting all over the place, and his pen was a mess. Tony decided to hose everything down and pulled on his wellington boots and thick gloves in preparation. He let himself into the pen.

Gordon glared at him and the hosepipe.

Tony switched on the water and aimed a jet at the ground, washing Gordon’s messes away.

Gordon, shivering, shrank into the corner as far away as possible. Tony needed to finish the job and did so as quickly as he could, not wanting to distress the bird.

“Hey, you know what?” he remarked to Simon later. “I reckon that gannet is afraid of water.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

Ridiculous it may have been, but Gordon the Gannet turned out to be an anorexic, aquaphobic, human-hating, non-flying seabird. How had he, a bird who wouldn’t fly and hated water, survived in the wild at all? It was a puzzling question.

Gordon couldn’t be released; he had come to stay. They drained the water out of his pond and he was much happier, although he had to endure the daily hosing out of his pen. He never fed himself and had to be force-fed daily.

Gannets live between 17 and 37 years so Gordon became the longest staying permanent resident in the sanctuary, even longer than Sandy the epileptic golden retriever or Pepper, the limping, confrontational Jack Russell. When I arrived at the sanctuary, Gordon had already been there some time, and he was still going strong, slashing anyone who came too close, after I left. I was never allowed near him as I was a casual worker and not insured against his onslaughts.

How did I know Gordon’s story in such detail? I knew because I had found my first ‘proper’ boyfriend, a fellow member of staff at the sanctuary…

If you’d like to read more, this excerpt comes from One Young Fool in Dorset by Victoria Twead available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones, Powells, Booktopia, The Book Depository and all good bookstores.

There is a photo album to accompany this book on the Free Stuff page.