1 AUGUST
Good news, bad news... Having decided to go ahead with the odyssey, I emailed Harry Mount, editor of The Oldie, to confirm that I was going and would file copy to him soon after my return, at the beginning of October. In return he sent me this poem by the Greek writer Cavafy, which I hadn't seen before and which I of course greatly appreciated.
In the evening, I read it to my friends Gary and Carmen who had just arrived in Granada after an epic and somewhat fraught odyssey of their own: three days and nights in a small car piled with their essential belongings plus their cat, Momo. They may not return from Spain – which is sad for me – but they have definitely done the right thing in getting out of the UK. This is the poem (and Carmen, who is extremely well versed in philosophy, already knew it)...
Ithaka
As you set out for Ithaka
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.
Hope your road is a long one.
May there be many summer mornings when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you enter harbours you’re seeing for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind—
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to learn and go on learning from their scholars.
Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you’re destined for.
But don’t hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you’re old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you’ve gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.
Ithaka gave you the marvellous journey.
Without her you wouldn't have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.
And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you’ll have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.
The bad news came from Francy, whose lovely house on the island of Tinos I stayed at last summer, and was hoping to revisit (along with its four canine residents) on 1 September. She said that it wouldn't be possible for me to stay because her parents (who look after the family home) are worried about the virus. I had such a great time there last year, thanks to Francy and her parents and their four very friendly dogs, that this was sad to hear – but understandable. Before the end of the evening I had booked a substitute place to stay – a room at a seafront hotel in town. I still hope to make it to my favourite beach on Tinos, just over the road from Francy's place.
My Greek guitarist friend writes: "Greece is at the moment experiencing a relative increase in C-19 cases but still we are talking about a couple of hundreds per day, most not serious in the February-June sense. Deaths (sorry to refer to this) are still very low, one or two per day and mostly old people with other underlying health issues. If you take proper precautions and care, I do not think you are under any particular danger."
2 AUGUST
The Greek National Tourist Office seems to be all over the internet pushing the country's undoubted attractions – with links to the red tape and restrictions attached to visiting playing second fiddle to sun-drenched images of idyllic beaches. Not surprisingly, the GNTO looks desperate to get people there. Let's hope that desperation extends to letting me through Athens without too much trouble.
Meanwhile, the UK continues to teeter on the edge of covid disaster amid rumours and reports of plans for some sort of second lockdown, most likely, it's being suggested, for the old and vulnerable – ie shut them away and let's get on with trying to get the economy up and running again.
3 AUGUST
Now there's even talk of shutting away the over-50s in the event of another virus surge – someone seems to be seriously underestimating the general health, resilience and (possibly) attitude of these supposedly "old" folk. Another scenario being discussed is stopping Londoners going beyond the M25. This madness has not only been exacerbated by the hopelessness of the political response in the UK, but also by the selfishness and ignorance of much of the population – largely those under 50, but also a fair proportion of those over 50, who should know better.
4 AUGUST
At least we're not in the US... That has become a kind of reassuring mantra, though god help those people who are stuck there, with a regime that seems incapable of getting a grip and doing something on behalf of its people rather than itself. A friend in Las Vegas writes of having to lose some of her paid leave to keep her work but her equivalent of my mantra is "at least I haven't lost my job like so many others have"... but she adds: "Do not get me started on that sorry excuse for a president..." That "sorry excuse" has now turned not only on the highly respected and popular Dr Anthony Fauci, but also on Dr Deborah Birx, the adviser who has previously appeared to perform diplomatic contortions to stay onside with the president while still attempting to be honest. The US is imploding and it looks some kind of hell will be let loose come the elections there this autumn.
5 AUGUST
A brilliant TV interview with Trump by Jonathan Swan, in which the Axios journalist fearlessly threw the president's fake news back at him should have finished off the incumbent's chances of another term – if enough swing voters saw it. The Biden campaign certainly saw their moment and seized on Trump's "It is what it is" verdict on 1,000 covid deaths a day in the US to juxtapose that comment against images of tragedy and create a chilling campaign ad.
Beirut has been devastated by an horrific and enormous accidental explosion. Trump – alone – rushed to announce that the city had been bombed. He seems incapable of getting anything right. Biden may have faults aplenty – but he may be America's only hope now.
6 AUGUST
Played drums for three hours today in Drumshack's practice room, wearing a mask – partly to stay safe and partly to see what it was like. The verdict: bloody hot – which is more than could be said for my drumming. I was having a first run through some (for me) difficult pieces to play at another three-day jazz course in Northamptonshire just before the odyssey. Being so warm seemed to make it impossible for my brain to grasp things – at least that's my excuse. I have a lot of work to do – on several fronts – before I am in a position to set off for Greece and Italy. And tomorrow looks like being extremely hot – around 35C – which is not conducive to concentration. Nice, though!
7 AUGUST
Tooting Bec Lido – closed since March – is to reopen next week. But you have to book online, you have to swim in designated lanes, and you won't be allowed to hang around. It doesn't sound like an appealing experience. But I renewed my membership for the umpteenth year just before the lockdown, so I'm kind of owed six months of swimming. The only problem is that when I try to log on to make online bookings, the system refuses to recognise that I'm a member. Maybe I'll wait until I get to Andros...
8 AUGUST
Ah... I'm now told that the online booking system for the Lido isn't open until 10 August. It's almost too hot to work today – even when wearing nothing (indoors, that is). It was almost too hot to sit in the sun yesterday, although I managed it for a short while. We seem to have Greece's weather. My Greek guitarist friend, with whom I was playing in an excellent jazz septet before lockdown, has spent most of the plague months in Athens. He is now at Myrtos in southern Crete but heading back to Athens around 24 August – the day before I am due to arrive there. We've agreed to try to meet. It would be amazing if we could.
Meanwhile, British Airways, the airline I'm depending on to get to Athens on 25 August, is announcing several thousand job losses and big cuts. Do I need to start thinking about the train again?
There are other little hitches on the horizon. There are now no ferries from Formia to Ponza (Circe's island) at the time I'm due there. That means going instead from Terracina – but even then there is no boat on the day that I need it. If the odyssey is to go ahead, I need to do some rescheduling and rebooking.
In optimistic mood, I ordered maps of Andros and Ithaca from Stanfords yesterday and they arrived first thing today – is this a good sign?
9 AUGUST
I've finished The Lord of the Rings. A few pages each night have been my bedtime reading since the lockdown began. An epic journey with all sorts of twists, turns and revelations – just like the lockdown and maybe the odyssey. Finally getting to the Grey Havens with Frodo was somehow anticlimactic. As that Ithaka poem says beautifully, it's the journey not the destination. And finishing Tolkien's masterwork seemed to leave a big hole. After that and daytime reading that has included House of Leaves and Ulysses and The Border Trilogy, what other big books are there to read? Proust? Somehow I don't fancy that. I was thinking if only Tolkien had written another book like TLOTR, another journey that could be enjoyed a few pages a night before sleep... And then I realised that I had ordered a copy of The Hobbit early on in the lockdown, for just such an eventuality, and there it was sitting on my table. The fact that I could have forgotten The Hobbit and forgotten that I had ordered a copy of it speaks volumes about the lockdown's effect on the brain...
10 AUGUST
Last-minute tweaks to the odyssey continue... I've just switched my accommodation in Andros from something pricy (it must have been the only choice when I rebooked it before) to something cheaper but probably just as good. Partly to save money, and partly to not lose quite so much money if I get stuck in Athens.
I told a veteran journalist friend that I was now dependent on British Airways, Boris Johnson and the Greek government. "I am sure you can rely on all three," he said. "But to do what, I don't know. I'm going to Nice in September – only relying on BA." And he added: "Boris can fuck himself. After he has finished fucking the country, of course."
Journalists, perhaps not surprisingly, do seem to be good at summing things up. Italy's Beppe Severgnini has been drawing the contrast between his country's success with America's failure. "The United States was born out of a rebellion, and you can still feel it," he said. "But to rebel, sometimes, is absurd – during a pandemic, for instance... Fear can be a form of wisdom. Boldness, a show of carelessness." And one more thing: "Ah, and we don't have Donald Trump, which helps."
11 AUGUST
I've provisionally booked hotels in Milan and Paris for my last stopovers on the return leg of the odyssey. But if the Greek half of the trip goes west, I'm thinking of doubling back from Italy to visit Ithaca – it wouldn't be an odyssey without that.
Why might Greece be a problem? Apart from the possibility of being quarantined in Athens, the country has just recorded its highest number of infections since the the start of the plague. Curfews and crackdowns are being talked about. The culprits are probably tourists (probably British ones) and young people partying in bars and on beaches without any thought for the consequences.
Oh, and infections are also rising again in Italy...
12 AUGUST
The use of violence and corruption to prop up the now clearly unelected regime in Belarus is beyond a disgrace. But no doubt it gets a pass from the way China and Russia (and now even the US) governments behave.
Joe Biden has named Kamala Harris as his running mate, and my dear friend in Oregon says: "Well, the terrible, terrible farce of this oligarchy's pretence of being democratic is still painful to have to face. The electorate are totally ignored. They don't even manufacture consent. They merely delete objection."
My response: "We could all be on the road to Belarus... Human violence's hold on the world (of people) grows stronger... The world itself will end this experiment that has gone so wrong..."
13 AUGUST
The Greek National Tourist Organisation's ad campaign appears to be gathering force – everywhere you turn on the internet, there's either an ad for Greece, or a piece of editorial that looks very much like sponsored advertorial.
Thunderstorms arrived in the UK yesterday and there was heavy rain here in London this morning. The ground is parched, the grass has lost all colour and burnt fallen leaves crackle underfoot. The rain is welcome, but it remains indecently hot and humid.
I have a commission to do a magazine piece on games the family can play at Christmas – strange, and perhaps not so strange, to be thinking now of winter and the end of the year and families perhaps stuck in a second lockdown. The copy is needed by 1 September – magazines like to work ahead.
14 AUGUST
The games piece is going well – thanks to some help from my son who is an expert and published academic on what games are all about. In fact, it's almost whetting my appetite for Christmas... One of the things that made the lockdown bearable was a weekly family quiz online. It was almost like the real thing, complete with fallings out over whether certain answers were correct or incorrect. Another thing has been weekly link-ups with my dear friends (and fellow walkers on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela last year) Gary and Carmen. It's been a regular Friday night treat. And as today is Friday, and even though Gary and Carmen have successfully moved to Spain, we'll be meeting again...
15 AUGUST
Today is Ferragosto – the big holiday day in Italy which heralds, for many, the start of their big two-week break. Many Italians – like many people in the UK – are staycationing and exploring their own country rather than those of others.
Brits who took a chance on a holiday in France have been Dunkirking their way back home after another swift (kneejerk?) decision by the UK government to impose a 14-day quarantine on those coming into the country from France.
At what point will the people who voted into power Boris Johnson, Gavin Williamson, Michael Gove, Priti Patel, Matt Hancock and, in effect, Dominic Cummings, realise that these people aren't up to the job – and that they made a grave mistake?
16 AUGUST
Just when things were looking possibly straightforward in relation to getting into Greece, provided I don't find myself on a plane with someone who tests positive for the plague, there is a further complication: getting from Greece into Italy. As things stand, Italy wants people coming from Greece to be carrying evidence of a negative coronavirus test done within 48 hours of arrival. Otherwise they will have to be tested in Italy; but there look like major hold-ups while tests are done in Italy – and I have just two hours to get from the port in Brindisi to the railway station. On top of that, in the 48 hours before that I will be in Ithaca and then, briefly, Patras. There's a good medical centre and a recommended pharmacy, run by Kostas (of course) in Vathi, near where I'll be staying, but will they be able to process a test that gives me the all-clear?
Odysseus would either have made a fake certificate or a raft... or chopped off the legs of anyone who tried to stop him. I may need to start figuring out my own cunning plan...
17 AUGUST
It may not be much of a plan but I've written a letter – in Greek and English – to the Ithaki Medical Centre explaining the situation, in the hope that they will email me to let me know if it will be possible to get a test done on 8 September. Who knows? It may be easier to get an appointment with a Greek doctor than with one in the UK.
A neighbour is off to Kefalonia this week, so I've asked her to feed back to me any information she can about what it's like getting through the airport etc...
18 AUGUST
Ah... it looks like my neighbour and I will be arriving in Greece on the same day in different airports, so we'll both be just keeping our fingers crossed that we get through OK... British Airways still hasn't cancelled my flight and there's now only a week to go... So Athens is starting to look like a real possibility.
19 AUGUST
Didn't sleep well... Seem to have been plagued in half-awake-half-dream state with variations to the odyssey: such as missing out Ithaca (to concentrate on getting covid test done in Patras) and coming back to it at the end of the trip; or missing out Scylla and Charybdis (in order to budget for quarantine/delay/testing at Brindisi) and returning to them later. The former would mean flying back from Athens; the latter, flying back from Sicily.
20 AUGUST
Emails keep flooding in full of reminders and confirmations and warnings. The main thrust is: make sure you have filled in the forms you will need to ensure you are allowed to travel and that you have a chance of getting through at the other end. I seem to have done everything I'm supposed to – the big holes being arranging a covid test in Greece prior to going to Italy (the Italians seem to have introduced this requirement in retaliation for the Greeks introducing similar, sensible restrictions), and possibly arranging a covid test in Italy before doubling back to Greece. Oh, and there is still no bus/ferry timetable for Patras-Ithaka, even though it was said that it would be published in mid-August. Almost everything now hinges on Ithaca, which seems right considering this is an odyssey.
21 AUGUST
I emailed the apartments in Ithaca to get their advice on whether they thought a covid test would be available at the medical centre on the island. They emailed back to say no it won't be... and suggested I just cancel going to stay there! I wrote back to say there was no way I was going to cancel... I'll find a way. Nothing is certain now, they said, gloomily.
22 AUGUST
I'm going to be positive. I will fly to Athens on 25 August... after that who knows? And if the Cassandra of Ithaca is right, who knows whether I'll even be on a plane to Athens that day? Nothing is certain. I think it's time to start looking at some possible major tweaks to the odyssey...
23 AUGUST
Syros – an island most people seem unaware of – hit the headlines because that's where the case of a famous British footballer, whom I'd never heard of, will be tried; he allegedly was involved in mayhem on neighbouring Mykonos, which most people do know. New pandemic restrictions have been introduced on Mykonos. Let's hope the virus and the international press don't descend on Syros – where, with luck, I should arrive on 2 September.
24 AUGUST
Today is a busy day. Got back fairly exhausted from a three-day jazz course in Northamptonshire last night, and now I have 24 hours to get everything ready to set off tomorrow. It's difficult to believe that the odyssey might actually happen... My (small) suitcase has been packed for a week or so... but there is a long list of things to do before heading for Heathrow tomorrow. One thing that occurred to me at the last minute was that it would be useful to have a kind of laissez passer letter from Harry Mount at The Oldie confirming that I am a bona fide journalist commissioned to follow in the wake of Odysseus. The only problem was that I'd left this a bit late. The wily Odysseus would of course simply have forged such a letter... so that's what I did...writing it in English, Italian and Greek... and printing it on paper with an authentic Oldie letterhead... with Harry's name on the bottom... I'm sure he won't mind... Well, until he reads this, he won't know...
To whom it may concern:
This letter is to confirm that Nigel Summerley is a journalist working for The Oldie magazine and has been commissioned to write an article about travelling through Greece and Italy in the footsteps of Odysseus (via Ithaca, Sicily, Salerno, Lucrino, Formia, Ponza and Rome). Please give him any assistance he may need.
Questa lettera conferma che Nigel Summerley e un giornalista chi lavora per la rivista inglese The Oldie e il e commisionato di scrivere un articolo per questa rivista dal viaggio per la Grecia e l'Italia – facendo lo stesso di Odysseus (via Ithaki, Sicilia, Salerno, Lucrino, Formia, Ponza e Roma). Per favore, lui da l'assistenza se ha besogno. Grazie mille.
Αυτα γραμμα επιβεβαιώνει μου Nigel Summerley ειναι ο δημοσιογράφος που δουλεύει για ο περιοδικό αγγλικός Δε Ολδι και γραφει ο απθρο για το περιοδικό για ταξίδι ομοιοσ με Οδυσσεος (μέσω Ιθακι, Σιξιλι, Σαλερνο, Λουκρινο, Φορμια, Πονζα και Ρομα). Παρακαλώ, μπορέτε να σας βοηθησετε; Ευχαριστώ.
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