Guest Blog: Don Weafer

Here, my Brother (in law) poetically shares a bit about his take on our Monday. I hope you love it as much as I do. - HP

I felt a teensy bit guilty tip toeing off to bed and leaving Donnie up to write today’s blog post. But knowing what a lovely writer he is, i figured it was best to leave him to his thoughts. I wasn’t wrong.

I have a confession: I’ve never been comfortable in the water, not really. I came to swimming late, and never wholly. I have known people, of course, who could harumph along on land and then slip into water and become otters, fluid, graceful, and full of play. But that has not been me. Swimming was never about the water, but only about the work: the grind and the back-and-forth and the constant struggle against a slow, frustrating, and unnatural medium that didn’t particularly want me moving through it. 

Until these past two days. 

I’ve never been in water like this. It feels like something different, warm and buoyant and full of light. On our first day in it, we played. We skimmed over white sand and dark grass, scattering fish like jewels and dodging ponderous, pulsing jellyfish. We dove down through arches and tunnels. We stopped, and marveled, and even swam a little, mostly when we realized we should probably get back to the boat that Richie held patiently in place for us, and whatever culinary delight Lisa had waiting (No peeking, though! That’s a rule!). 

This afternoon was something else altogether. After setting aside our play to put in a couple of miles this morning, we rejoined the boat and traveled to a wilder shoreline with high, sheer islands that lunged up from the sea like monuments. With lunch still in the offing, we dove back in. At the head of the island, Heather and Simon showed us The Rooms, which, as far as we’re concerned, they discovered. A dive down under a rock shelf, a turn to find the sky and follow our bubbles to the surface, and there we were, in a pool surrounded by weathered stone and filled with light, like something out of myth. I believe the appropriate term here is “grotto.” If it isn’t, it should be.

From The Rooms (Heather’s Baths? Simon’s Grottos?), we turned the corner and headed into deeper water. Here the cliffs seemed to fall from the sky and past us into the deep blue, furred with algae and studded with sponges, stone carved like statuary by the waves. It should have been frightening. It could have felt like falling. Instead, it felt like gliding, like skimming along the surface of something we couldn’t join, not entirely, but which welcomed us all the same, dabblers though we are.                                                        

I should say more: more about the cove where we are anchored near an olive grove, more about the food; more about the napping and playing cards with new friends, but I’m the last one awake, and there’s swimming to look forward to in the morning.

- Don Weafer

The wild and wonderful surrounds of Georgio Island throw something new at us each time.

We are treated to serene views in and out of the water at our overnight anchorage off Peristera Island. We played a little Mediterranean waterpolo, boomed jellies, floated and enjoyed cards. Donnie found a chair on shore under an olive tree. I think he lives here now.