Boat, loves and other lives

 

Me on the Boat

So I cleaned and cooked in villas and worked for some very nice people, I brought a rcing bike and cycled everywhere and decided I would like to live in the area, so I got myself a racing bike and looked for a permanent position, I searched the ads in the Var Matin and found a job as a chef in a beach restaurant, Antinea Plage at Port Grimaud. All started out well, quite gently there were only a few customers and very few staff, the mistral blew but no one minded too much. From kind beginings all hell let loose, 20 - 200 customers from one day to the next, the waiters miraculously multiplied and the other member of the kitchen staff, my second chef and washer upper dissapeared not to return. I was left alone in a blizzard to sand, the mistral blew and I certainly minded. Gambas Flambee served with sand, gritty washing up, irate waiters, impatient customers, late delivaries, the whole concoction boiled, bubbled and burst. I could take no more, after a month with no day off and no let up, I gave up, they needed three men to take my place and that is what they got!

I was very glad to be out of there, I had time to be dispondant for about an hour. The very same evening I left the beach job, there was a phone call from an agency asking me if I could go to an interview the next morning in St Tropez for a permanant position as Chef/Housekeeper on a two masted schooner. Sailing Yacht 'Mystere of England' was to become my home for the next five years.

I met the Captain and the First Mate in the Bar Tabac, we all got on well, I was cautioned by the Captain that as well as working hard I would have to play hard, I wasn't too  sure what playing hard meant, but I was soon to find out.

I was asked to do a weeks try out on the boat to see if the owner liked both me and my cooking, as I was now jobless I jumped at the opportunity. The next week I tooke the ferry from St Tropez to St Maxime then the train from St Maxime changing at Cannes to Menton old port where the boat was berthed. I recomend the train journey, it is a feast for the eyes along this beautiful coast, mountains and azure sea, palm trees and promise of pleasure time.

By the time I got to Menton I was very nervous and shaking, clammey hands and what if's. By the time I got off the train and was walking down towards the port dusk was settling in to give way to night and I arrived just in time to find the crew all going out and leaving me alone on the boat to unpack and prepare for the next day. Bemused this is what I did.

 

Comments

[Charlie Brooks]

Thanks I love it please do more when the words feel right.I am catching up with your life and I love it

wish I knew how to insert hearts and kisses, cos that is what I would do.
xxx
Charlie

[Charlie Brooks]

Gosh you look young in this photo. Guess that is what life is all about the passage of time being shown on our faces. Our stories, giving us character in our laugh lines and song lines. Life is quite fine really if we think of our selves as a good book. I am enjoying your book a lot. Thanks
Charlie xx

[elliebaker@aol.com]

Little Tess....I love you so...Been some rough old seas for us both on this life's journey aye? Your words are lovely and the picture of you made me happy and sad and sad and happy...and reminded me of the video Little Mickey took on the way to the Galapogas...Love you more than words can say xxx Ellie