The last full day of the holiday and though we were totally back into Lotus Eating mode, it was impossible to relax completely as the tautening of the elastic that is about to pull us back to the UK was impossible to ignore.
I swam out to Hippo Rock to wish my subjects (a crab and some lichen) adieu. I have not spent happy hours on this island as I did with Chard Island eight years ago. Hippo Island is an inhospitable place, and more fun to look at from the land than to sit on and observe the rest of the world. So it's kind of the opposite vibe. Chard Island was an escape from what was going on in the rest of the world for me, but I do not want that now. I want to be on the land with the person I am with, rather than in the sea escaping them. So that's a positive turn around.
Plus I get all cut up and hurt every time I get on to Hippo Island and then it's hard to keep on the perch and I am constantly afraid that a wave will send me head first crashing on to one of the many submerged rocks dotted around the one that sticks out. It's a place of violence not of peace.
But today my brain was starting to think of all the things that I have to do once the island of Hippo and the island of Grenada are left far behind. Foremost in my mind is the need to get fit again. Though I planned to swim for 30 minutes every day while I was here, I never got over 20 and in fact only made it over 10 about 3 times. Now a few strokes and I am exhausted.
But for the moment I am still living the life of a greedy, Western, ancestor of a bell ringing slave owner and so I gorged on lobster and creamy cocktails in front of the bay that has been my home for a fortnight.
We started making friends towards the end of the stay - when it's safe to do so, because, you know, if they turn out to be dicks then you only have to put up with them for a couple of days. The people we've met are very pleasant though, luckily. And the guy who talked to me about football all those months ago (or so it feels), has turned out to be a lot of fun and hasn't talked to me about football again, but an impressive range of subjects from the cracking of the Enigma code to Ernest Hemingway to Muhammed Ali to Chubby Brown. Football was clearly his safe way in and he hadn't wanted to scare me with all the other stuff he was bursting to tell me about. I have given him my copy of Bad Science, which he and his wife are both going to read. It's good to think of that information being passed on to as many people as possible and it saves me giving it to Collings and him refusing to read it.
It's horrible to think that within hours I will be heading back to cold and stinky Britain, though I am sure there are many things I will be happy to see when I am there - Caffe Nero and The Guardian natch (interestingly although I have access to the Guardian on the internet, I haven't had a look - it has to be in paper form or nothing. Maybe I only like it for the sudoku).
But let's not waste the last few hours of sunlight talking to you mo-fos. Even though I don't especially like football, like football I am coming home.
