Nine Summers Page 11

  Although the inlets were filled with yachts in the summer months, they were quiet. Everyone, it seemed to us, was addicted to ‘The Ritual of Bronzage’. People lay motionless on the beach or on the back of boats equipped with thick mattresses. The procedure was to baste and rotate every twenty minutes. Only a cigarette, lunch or a call of nature induced anyone to suspend ‘thinking Bronzage’. And so the days passed. After dark, lights from portholes glittered on rippled water, yachts rocked on shafts of moonlight, and the bay was silent.

  The approaches to Bonifacio, on the southern tip of Corsica, resemble an exotic geological formation a billion years old, indented with steep escarpments, caves and grottos. We couldn’t work out where to turn in. Finally, we followed an island ferry, on the assumption that its captain had made it to the entrance before. We had never seen anything like Bonifacio harbour.

  The old town is inside the fortress at the top of a daunting escarpment, which has views over the harbour below, and across the Straits of Bonifacio to Sardinia, a few miles away. ‘An ideal harbour for pirates and bandits,’ Felix said.

  But most of the action was at sea level when we were there. The marina was at the end of the long, deep, fjord-like bay, with many indents where yachts tied up against rock faces.

  We were ingenues when we arrived in Corsica, and had to acquire special Mediterranean skills. Soon after leaving Calvi, a breeze filled our sails and we drifted on in silence. There was no vessel in sight, and we were both reading. Now and again we looked up at the beauty of the sea and coastline, and felt as if we were alone in the world. After a long spell of such bliss, I went down to prepare lunch. Suddenly, the deafening silence was shattered by a ‘SHWUSSH’ and a loud ‘SHIT!!!’

  I popped my head out just as a sailing vessel slipped past our stern, and a slim naked bottom stared me in the face. The shock sent my pulse racing. This palest of bottoms turned to reveal a full frontal view of a bearded young man, with long hair, pained dark eyes and outstretched arms.

  ‘Jesus Christ!’

  I cried out. ‘That wasn’t Jesus Christ. It’s a metal boat, and had it been sailing 5 degrees further east it would have sliced through us!’ Felix was in a state of shock.

  ‘I’ve never seen such a shocked naked man with arms outstretched. I thought it was a Visitation!’

  Felix didn’t think this was funny. The near sinking horrified him.

  Neither the young man nor we had been keeping watch. His boom hit our stays, and his sail swept our sail, on an open, empty sea. It was a salutary, close shave.

  ‘OK. From now on,’ Felix decreed, ‘only one of us reads. The other stays on watch!’

  Most of our Mediterranean learning experiences related to methods of tying or untying at odd quays or rock walls. Sometimes we had to go in bow first, at other times stern first. Our most exciting attempt prompted a young Frenchman to risk his life. He dived off his boat, caught our line, which was much too short for our purpose, lengthened it with a rope he supplied, and tied it to a steep rock face in Bonifacio.

  Later that day, when a ferocious wind hit and he had to move to the other side, he wouldn’t let us untie his rope and return it to him. ‘Pas de problème, no problem,’ he assured us. ‘Demain, give it back tomorrow.’

  Some days later, when it looked as if we were going to be blown onto a different constellation of rocks, another Frenchman rescued us by jumping into his dinghy and taking our anchor out.

  ‘There must be advantages in looking old, frail and foreign. But we need to make a list of our problems,’ I concluded. ‘OK. Our problems are due to:

  1 Not having the anchor ready.

  2 Not having the chain locker open.

  3 Not having the dinghy prepared and tied to the bow.

  4 Not having adequate ropes ready.

  5 Not having the anchor winch turned on.

  ‘Lists, Puss, there’s nothing like making lists for every contingency and sticking them on the appropriate wall close to the gangway.’

  By the time we reached the first island between Corsica and Sardinia, our style had definite panache. But we still needed to learn how to deal with ‘spaghetti anchor lines’.

  In many ports in Italy, unlike France, it was customary to tie up to the public quay. The method was to drop the anchor a long way out, then back the boat up to the quay, squeeze in between two boats, and tie up. We managed that without anyone needing to risk their lives for us.

  By evening other boats had done the same, but when there was no room on the quay, boats tied up to the boat in front of them. Sometimes half a dozen were tied one behind the other, and anchor lines and chains criss-crossed. At first we were naïve enough to tie up to the quay whenever possible, but the traffic of people stepping back and forth across Galatea’s deck at all hours of the night was brisk, and each time they stepped on board, we were woken with: ‘Permesso, sorry, pardon, entschuldigung…’

  If we planned to leave early in the morning, we had to allow up to two hours to untangle the anchor lines. Watching other people untangle these in a mixture of languages and temperaments certainly did afford a morning’s entertainment. On the deck of every boat onlookers tried to assist: ‘…si, si, un poco a destra, a little to the right, poco piu, a little more, nein, nein…mais non, un petit peu à droite, a little bit to the right…’

  The first time we found ourselves on an Italian quay and had not yet mastered the exercise, Felix watched and studied the technique. Soon he’d convinced himself that ‘we’re not the only idiots’. And when we pulled out of the marina at La Maddalena, our manoeuvres were so expert we couldn’t resist beaming from ear to ear.

  ‘Porto Cervo in Sardinia is a must!’ we were told. ‘It’s the most expensive marina in Christendom, the Aga Khan’s playground. Guaranteed by arrangement, no kidnapping during summer months. But for goodness sake, don’t tie up at the marina. It’ll cost you an arm and a leg. You can put down an anchor in the bay and go ashore in the dinghy.’

  Armed with this piece of information, we made for Sardinia. First to Porto Liscia, then Porto Pollo, a crystal bay where we went slightly aground and were pulled off by another yacht, and then on to Porto Cervo where we anchored in the roadstead, a large bay, among bigger and more glamorous boats.

  Porto Cervo was the first Italian port where we could request the mandatory boat documentation, the constituzio, to sail in Italian waters. While Felix set off to the capitaineria di porto, I bought myself a Herald Tribune and the most expensive cappuccino I’d ever had and waited. Felix returned after an hour.

  ‘The officer-in-charge didn’t stop talking about Australia. Of course he has relatives there. In Melbourne and in Perth. As for the constituzio, he said nothing will happen to us if we don’t have one. He said it was really hot today. Too hot to bother. He suggested we should get one in Elba. And now I need a cappuccino.’

  ‘Sure, but don’t ask how much they charge.’

  The next day we moved on and anchored in a nearby quiet bay. The weather was magnificent and the water still, when a young man in a dinghy, obviously despatched from the marina, came alongside Galatea in the late afternoon to tell us there was a severe storm forecast for the night. ‘You should come into the marina. It will be safer for you…’ We found this very thoughtful. But it was a clear, still evening and when we turned on the radio for a forecast, there was no mention of storms. So we decided to chance it and stayed.

  It was a starlit, idyllic night. Apart from the occasional grumble of the anchor chain, there was no movement at all. Later, we realised the ‘storm warning’ was a regular ploy used to fill marinas. We’d mastered tying up against rock faces, but we still had a lot to learn.

  A steady 20-knot wind, gusting 30, zoomed us from Sardinia north to Porto-Vecchio in Corsica. The air was a veil of sapphire. Needles of spray pricked our faces as Galatea cut the waves and raced the wind towards the Gulf, where shades of blue tinted each layer of the mountain range.

  ‘It’s like a Chinese landsca
pe painting.’

  It was a long, steep walk to Porto-Vecchio village at the top of the escarpment. In the central village square, waiters with trays held high flitted between tables under pergolas smothered in creepers. The scent of jasmine and sea filled the air. Old men played chess and cards, visitors read papers and everyone drank wine or coffee.

  ‘Apart from tourists and the marina, I bet nothing’s changed here for centuries.’

  ‘There’s something attractive about little change.’

  We bought a paper, sipped wine and stretched our legs. ‘It was a fabulous sail today, Puss. But it’s even better to sit still now.’

  Felix smiled. ‘Enjoy stretching your legs. Tomorrow we should move to St Cyprien at the northern end of the Gulf, and leave from there for Elba after midnight.’

  On our last night in Corsica, Felix spent a long time taking sights of the numerous rocks around us, then bent over the navigation table and, with parallel rule, dividers and 2B pencil in hand, plotted our course out of St Cyprien.

  ‘It’s going to be pitch black, no moon, and we’ll have to go out of here entirely on radar. That way we’ll only have four hours with no visibility. It’ll dawn at about 5,’ Felix reassured me.

  We weighed anchor shortly after 1 am. Although Felix was confident and in complete control as we moved between boulders that neither of us could see, I found the exercise nerve-racking. It was black, not even a shore light in view. I sat in the cockpit, and kept my eyes on the tiny red radar light. Galatea was creaking and groaning, as aware of the rocks as I was.

  As soon as we had cleared the rocks I relaxed, and set the autohelm on a 40-degree course for Elba.

  ‘Do we now have a late supper or early breakfast?’

  ‘Whichever is bigger,’ Felix replied.

  ‘Welsh rarebit?’

  ‘Great.’

  Coffee was already in the thermos. We ate in the cockpit, with our eyes glued to the radar screen. Three small ships moved across the screen in different directions.

  ‘I wish it’d start to dawn.’

  ‘It will, sooner than you think.’ Felix put his arm around me.

  To see the dawn creep and sweep away the night’s blackness is as heady as sailing under a brilliant moon. The first thin stripe of colour lined the eastern sky as the island of Monte Cristo appeared on radar. Soon after, an arc of brilliant yellow peeped over the horizon, and the sky changed slowly from dark grey to mandarin and pink. Then, the grey outlines of Monte Cristo and its neighbouring island of Pianosa came into view, both set against a pink sky.

  We sailed on. The sea had now changed from black to dark blue, the morning breeze had stiffened, and our wake trailed and spun like a cord. The sun was high when Elba appeared under a cloudless sky. We made for Porto Azzurro.

  We furled the sails at the entrance to the harbour, turned on the engine and looked at the crowded quay. ‘Let’s tie up behind that Austrian boat. There are only two in front of her.’

  ‘It’s 4.30, just over fifteen hours. It was a good crossing. No drama.’

  We dropped anchor and motored slowly up to the yacht flying an Austrian flag. The couple on board stood on their aft deck and helped us tie up.

  ‘Did you come from Corsica?’

  ‘Yes, we’ve spent the last two weeks in Corsica and Sardinia.’

  ‘What’s the food like in Corsica?’

  ‘Jams are great,’ I said, ‘but sometimes I think Corsican food and wine were the reasons Napoleon fled to France.’

  I wasn’t surprised they asked about the food. They looked like hearty eaters.

  ‘Where have you come from?’ Felix asked.

  ‘Tuscany. It’s beautiful but very crowded. We hope to find some quiet spots on the islands. Here in Porto Azzurro it’s very noisy. Portoferraio and anywhere on the other side of Elba is much better. We’re on our way to Greece for a few months. Maybe also Turkey…Come over and have a drink with us!’

  I was beat, but Felix wanted to talk to them about Tuscany, so we joined them.

  Among yachties, the conversation invariably centred on where one had been, advice on where to go, where not to go, and an exchange of hair-raising stories. At this stage of our travels, we were mainly the recipients of advice. So we chatted for a while until they noticed that I was ready to drop. ‘We’ll let you rest. Enjoy Elba.’

  Portoferraio is a great spot as long as you don’t tie up at the noisy quay. We anchored in the roadstead instead, and from there had a view of the whole long saddle of the town. On our own, in the middle of the bay, we swung on our anchor chain, and pointed into the wind. The breeze swept through the front hatch, and seagulls perched on the crosstrees on the lookout for crumbs.

  Each day we motored to the quay by dinghy, had coffee in the main square, read the Herald Tribune and watched the passing parade. Sometimes, we motored in for a stroll and meal in the evening. T-shirts were our new fascination. No matter what the nationality of the wearer, the inscriptions were always in English. ‘I love NY’, ‘I love LA’, ‘I love San Fran’ but never ‘I love Rome’ or ‘J’aime Paris’.

  When enough time had elapsed for our mail to be couriered to Elba, we set off on our daily mission to the post office. But each day the people at the counter stared at us as if we’d come from a planet where mail was delivered regularly, even at the height of summer.

  ‘It was sent by courier!’ We argued.

  ‘But in summer the couriers are on holiday!’ they said.

  ‘It’s useless,’ I said to Felix as we stepped into the dinghy to motor home.

  Napoleon was mad, we decided. He lived up on the hill overlooking the bay, in the Palazzina dei Mulini, for just ten months from May 1814, when he reigned over this small kingdom. Apart from this ‘town palace’, where he lived with his mother and sister, he had a summerhouse.

  ‘Napoleon was not only mad, but greedy, and bored as well. After all, for a loser he didn’t do too badly. A beautiful island, lots of beaches, two houses…’ I said.

  ‘Ah! Ambitious and in need of Lebensraum, space.’

  Elba is a ‘safe-feeling’ kind of place with a gentle landscape, different from the wild rugged beauty of Corsica and Sardinia. Italians who live in Tuscany use Elba as we’d used Broken Bay, north of Sydney. It’s easy to find shelter for boats, there are numerous beaches, and it’s possible to get away from crowds and swim in crystal water.

  ‘Maybe we could find a wintering place for Galatea here?’

  We were amazed when the first boatyard we investigated was owned by an Australian. ‘Yes, I guess you are surprised,’ he said. ‘When I finished school in Melbourne, I decided to come and live in Italy where my parents had come from. I love living in Elba…’ But Elba was packed and he couldn’t help us.

  ‘It’s mid-August and time to move on to the mainland…’ Felix said as we made our way yet again to the post office.

  ‘Yes, on to Tuscany!’

  ****

  All the private marinas in Viareggio were packed. We had no alternative but to tie up in the ugly industrial marina, with a large Saudi yacht undergoing massive renovations on one side of us and a clapped out yacht with a charming poodle on the other. But we didn’t mind — it was free, it was easy to get the refrigerator gassed and minor repairs done, and in any case, we were ready to move on and start our sentimental journey north along the Italian Riviera.

  The eastern half of the Italian Riviera, the Riviera di Levante — with its promontories, inlets, bays and villages — has attracted painters, writers and poets for centuries. Lerici, at the foot of a steep incline that slopes down to a horseshoe bay in the Gulf of La Spezia, is now both a fishing village and a tourist resort. Dante was an early visitor to Lerici. Many English exiles who had chosen to live in Italy spent time here. For early nineteenth century romantics, Italy was ‘the paradise of exiles’, where they hoped to experiment with new forms of life and new rules. Many writers and poets, like Byron and Shelley, had chosen to lead ‘gypsy lives’, f
or which Felix and I had a newly acquired understanding.

  In 1822 Shelley lived here in the hope of improving his health, but alas, drowned when his boat sank in bad weather. His many literary friends felt the need to give him a dramatic send-off. So, in the presence of Byron, Leigh Hunt, Trelawny, local militia and fishermen, Shelley was cremated. A copy of Keats’s poems was thrown onto the pyre. Byron, in an emotional state, swam 3 miles out to his yacht, the Bolivar, and back. After the cremation, Trelawny raked out Shelley’s heart and gave it Byron, who passed it on to Leigh Hunt, who in turn gave it to Shelley’s wife Mary. Trelawny knew that Byron would have liked Shelley’s skull, but remembering that Byron had once used a skull as a drinking vessel, decided not to give it to him.

  The stretch of coastline from Viareggio north to the Gulf of La Spezia, Lerici and Portovenere had been a stomping ground for these English Romantics. But the closest we came to feeling the Romantics’ presence was a café called the Café Byron, and also a plaque in Portovenere that commemorates Byron in grandiloquent language: ‘…the immortal poet who as a daring swimmer defied the waves of the sea from Portovenere to Lerici’. I imagine this impressed the villagers more than the English exiles’ experiments in new forms of living. We continued north, past the Cinque Terre — the five fishing villages set in narrow, shallow inlets — towards our destination, Portofino.

  For us, Portofino will always stir memories of that summer’s day in 1953 when we had vowed that some day we’d have our own boat and sail the Mediterranean.

  Some months beforehand, we’d arrived in London from Australia in a cargo ship. Felix had signed up as ship’s surgeon in exchange for a free passage. Our official reason for coming to England was to further Felix’s surgical training, to get his FRCS (Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons), but our real agenda was to see the world. We were young, adventurous and impecunious. At the end of Felix’s first hospital stint as a surgical resident, we crossed the English Channel and made for the South of France and Italy.