My Symi Wild Flower Garden

Spring is in the air and with the switch to summer time last Sunday the days are suddenly significantly longer. More yachts have appeared in the harbour, recent arrivals from Marti Marina in Orhaniye, across the way in Turkey. Cruising yachtsmen who have spent the winter safely berthed in a sheltered modern marina and who are now thrust out into the uncertain sailing conditions of April in the Aegean. Some are regular sailors in the area, others are new-comers, circumnavigators about to embark on their first Mediterranean cruising season after the long-haul passage-making of the Indian Ocean.

The weather is mild, if a little chilly, and rain is expected to reach us on Thursday with showers forecast for the rest of the week. Temperatures will remain around 20 degrees on Symi although it will be quite chilly still at night.

My Symi wild flower garden is a bobbing mass of red poppies, a-hum with orgiastic bees. They wallow in each bloom until all the pollen is gone and the papery petals are bruised purple and fall to the ground. There are many more hives on Symi this year – in fact a few weeks ago, returning from Rhodes on the Proteus, we were intrigued to see a stack of hives in the vehicle hold, lids taped down with parcel tape to prevent accidents with the inhabitants.

Here in Yialos preparations for the season are firmly underway – piles of tables and chairs stacked outside for repainting while awnings are restrung and the mildew of winter scrubbed off the walls. Boxes of souvenirs and summer clothes are being unpacked and the winter woollies have been marked down to bargain prices. Symi is unfurling from her winter sleep.

Have a good week.

Regards,

Adriana