TRAVELLERS’ TALES

Little Gigolo

          The little guy seen here earned his living at the Ardastra Gardens at Nassau in The Bahamas. He was not a Meeter-and-Greeter, that post being held by a Vietnamese pot-bellied pig at the entrance. Although, to tell the truth, the day we visited she was asleep on the job. The Moluccan cockatoo’s role was more a Thank-You-for-Coming, with his supervisor popping him onto a visitor’s shoulder for a final photo-op near the exit.

          I wasn’t at all thrilled at having such a wicked-looking beak that close to my eyes. So I was mortified when the man said, 'Give the lady a kiss, Toby,' and the bird bent dutifully towards my face. Yet at the very moment that my mind went blank with panic, so I became aware of the most delightful sensation imaginable. Using only the smooth outer curve of his unexpectedly warm beak and his warm round tongue, Toby was gently, seductively, caressing my left earlobe.

          From his laid-back attitude in this picture, taken immediately afterwards, I can’t help thinking that he looks rather pleased with the effect he’s just achieved. I hope so. Because I was.

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Donkey Days

          As a blogger myself I am naturally interested in those of other people. As an animal-lover, and also someone who has spent time in The Netherlands, my attention was riveted a few years ago by a British newspaper item about a £6.4million European Union socialisation project which included an internet diary by a Dutch donkey.

          Naturally, given the effort it took David and I (David, actually) to get my own blog up and running, the first thing I wanted to know was whether the donkey had set up his site himself, or if he employed a professional. I also wondered if he had a specially-adapted keyboard.

          Sadly, just because we’d all been plunged into the world’s biggest recession since the 1920s, a few short-sighted tax-payers had questioned this creative enterprise. Which in turn aroused the usual furore about who exactly was monitoring the billions pouring out of EU coffers. There was a danger, of course, that this kind of negative publicity would drive the donkey into hiding. Donkeys tend towards the quiet life and exposure to a media circus could be catastrophic.

          However, given his natural disadvantages, to have achieved what he had already I suspected he must possess a rare talent for self-promotion and that it could only be a matter of time before he sold the exclusive rights to his story. This would inevitably focus on his underprivileged start in life and early rejections. It would, of course, also be timed to coincide with the publication of My Ten Best Tips For Starting A Blog to be quickly followed by How to Tap Into EU Project Funding. And after this, I assumed, there would be a world book tour and a circuit of the sofas on the many morning television shows. How I envied him, my own begging letters to the EU having been returned marked, ‘Gone Away’. During a bout of ennui at my own keyboard recently, I got to thinking about him again and looked him up on the internet.

          But his diary is no more. The project, it turns out - and despite its cost - was only ever intended to last a year. After such a whirlwind of attention I can’t help wondering what effect this had on the poor donkey. I mean, how do you go back to standing about in a field after you’ve been on Oprah?

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The Porker Handicap

          After we bought Voyager, one of our earliest passages was a summer spent around the coast of Ireland. On one particular afternoon we arrived at Arklow, tied up to the town quay and walked into the nearest shop to buy some fresh bread for lunch.

          ‘You’ve five minutes,’ said the woman behind the counter.

          ‘Sorry?’ we said.

          ‘The pig racing. It starts in five minutes.’

          Now, with this being Ireland, and our accents noticeably English, you have to measure the information imparted to you on a blarney scale of 1-10, depending on how much of a smirk there is on the informant’s face.

‘At the top of the street,’ she said, handing us our change without so much as a twitch of the lip. ‘If you hurry, you’ll catch the start.’

          We had intended to return to the boat and have a meal, but climbed the hill instead. The town was holding its Annual Pig Race. A course had been cordoned off with tape. The runners, about Babe-size and with numbers on their backs, were oinking gently and being held in check with some difficulty on the starting line. The stewards stood ready. Then, suddenly, they were OFF!

          Some milled about at the start, unsure as to what was expected of them. Some were more interested in the punters shouting encouragement at them from the side lines and went over to the tape to stare up at them. Three others noticed the bribes being waved at them from the other end of the track by their owners and set off at a steady pace.

          Quite soon one of the little porkers in this trio started to show a good turn of speed. The crowd began to cheer him on. He began to respond, little trotters pounding the tarmac. With his owner at the finishing post waving a special treat ever more vigorously at him, he was emerging as a clear favourite, while the most likely candidates for second and third places were trotting up a short distance behind. The crowd began to roar its approval. And then it happened.

          At just past the half-way mark, someone threw a bag of chips in the path of the front-runner. And naturally he stopped to enjoy the unexpected bounty. He was soon joined by the two runners-up. Finally, aware of something interesting happening up ahead, the back of the field caught up and the race became a circle of up-ended pink bottoms and curly tails and a lot of satisfied grunting.

          There was a protest, of course, a steward’s enquiry and a re-run was called for and agreed to. But questions remained. Would the runners who had completed half the course be handicapped by being tired? Should they be given a head start? Bets were altered. After a brief delay, the runners were lifted protesting from the torn chip bag, set down at the starting line again and the race re-started.

          This time, all the piglets set off with a will. Unfortunately, at the same point in the course - identifiable from the grease mark on the tarmac - the whiff of salt and vinegar exercised its irresistible magic and they all pulled up and waited expectantly.

          I suppose that’s life in a nutshell, really. You just never know when a flying bag of chips is going to arrive.

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Historic Haarlem

          Holland’s medieval Haarlem is a favourite city of ours, with its huge town square, massive cathedral and ornate town hall. The square hosts a great many open-air cafés and a colourful market twice a week. The cathedral is particularly appealing to the romantically-minded.

          Medieval cathedrals throughout Europe once had lean-to buildings around their bases which were used as housing or workshops. They can be seen in old paintings and etchings; somewhat primitive and crumbling but picturesque. Over time these buildings were cleared away and when you visit the cathedrals today their outer walls are uncluttered.

          Haarlem’s cathedral is an exception. It has retained the lean-to buildings. They are not the dilapidated hovels of the past, of course, but neat, one-storey shops mostly given over to antiques and books. What makes them particularly attractive is their wooden window shutters. Instead of opening vertically, their lower half drops down to make a counter and the upper half props up as an awning. It makes a very pleasant place to browse through second-hand books and bric-a-brac.

          A short walk away is the former Alms House, founded in 1609, which is now the Frans Hals Museum. Hals (1582-1666) painted local worthies such as the five regents who administered this home for elderly men. His painting of these regents, as well as many more of his fine portraits are on display here. Perhaps his most famous work, or the one which most captured the popular imagination at least, is The Laughing Cavalier.

          Across the road, in a modest little building, is a small museum devoted to Haarlem’s social history. One room is furnished with the original dresser, table, chairs, paintings, china and silverware that graced the administrators’ dining room of the town’s orphanage. And you can’t get away from it: the people running these charitable institutions lived well. Very well. Especially given that the funding stretched even beyond supplying them with a very good table to immortalizing them in oils by some of the foremost painters of the day.

          Unusually, there is also a small painting of some of the orphans here. Looking suitably grateful they wear the institution’s distinctive uniform, with one red sleeve and one blue sleeve, so that even when taken through the streets to church on Sundays, to thank God for His bounty, it would be obvious to all and sundry that these children were a burden on the parish. It reminded me of Charles Dickens’ novel Oliver Twist, set during a similar period. Now, Dickens wasn’t above a bit of exaggeration to make a point, and he is particularly graphic in his condemnation of the fat Members of the Board who preside over the English orphanage where the hapless Oliver, slowly starving on a diet of watery gruel, asks plaintively if he can please have some more to eat. Having contemplated the dining room of the Haarlem orphanage, I have quite revised my view as to the veracity of Dickens’ description.

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Drifting Down To Sneek

          I am currently writing about our Atlantic crossing for my latest book in the Voyager series. In sailing terms, our present location could not be more different.  Far from a vast empty sea between the Cape Verde Islands and the Caribbean we are currently tied up to a Dutch canal bank.

          We have spent the night, in this narrow cutting off the main canal, en route to Sneek (pronounced Schnake).  Its only facilities were a few wooden stumps to throw a mooring rope around, a spectacular sunset and a blissfully quiet night.

          After casting off this morning we turn a corner and re-enter the main canal. Around this bend is a small farmhouse with fields beyond. On the waterfront is the kind of desirable shed-cum-apartment the Dutch provide for their goats. Its tenant suns himself luxuriously on the roof. Somewhere a cock is crowing. A patch of sunflowers turn their great yellow heads towards the morning sun.

          At the water’s edge a coot, a duck and a moorhen share a rock. Diversity.  Further along, the canal’s wooden edging provides a bathing ledge for a row of ducks, one dozing on its stomach with a wing draped casually over the side.  A little apart, stands a young heron.

          One of the pleasures of this life is the waterfowl and since early summer the canals and rivers have been full of young birds. The noisiest and most demanding are the offspring of the Great Crested Grebe. Grey-and-white-striped, they shriek continuously for food, sometimes throughout the night, and I could swear that the parents sometimes dive under water for no other reason than to get a few moments peace.  They are, however, delightful as tiny chicks clambering onto their mother’s back to be transported.  Sometimes as many as four at a time.

          Within an hour we are tied up at the historic and picturesque town quay of Sneek, with all the hurly-burly of boats passing through a busy opening bridge, and the cheerful chatter of Saturday morning shoppers and coffee drinkers.

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