Over and Under

One of the cardinal rules for Buchanan sojourners is that everything you take on a family adventure involving airplane travel must fit in an overhead bin, or be stowed under the seat in front of you. This generally results in taking an assortment of school backpacks, stuffed to the gills with all sorts of necessities. Each airline traveler is also allowed a personal item—a purse or small bag—so each of us actually carries two bags on our adventures. Since, for this trip, we will be away for six continuous weeks, we bent the cardinal rule about checked bags and brought two suitcases with wheels.

Everything we deemed necessary or important for these six weeks fits within these bags except for two books—the Holy Bible and a novel stuffed with two unopened cards, various notes, and receipts. Thus, at any given moment in transit, four to five of us are carrying two bags and one other item— a heavy suitcase, the Bible or a book. (We take turns leading “the Gospel Procession!”) As of day three, this has proven only marginally functional, and other possible solutions are under consideration.

At 6 a.m. without the benefit of coffee, we left our hotel in Athens and trekked approximately 8 blocks uphill to the nearest subway station. The wheels on the suitcases were worth every penny! After taking the subway to the Pireaus Port, we boarded a large ferry bound for the Cyclades. Our destination, Naxos, was the second stop for the ferry, with an anticipated time of arrival coming about five hours later.

This ship was not the fastest vessel coursing through the Aegean Sea, but it did have an impressive eight levels of decks, abundant seating, cafés, coffee shops, and even a gift shop. (Who contemplates shopping on a ferry ride?)

We made a crucial mistake, which is entirely understandable for those of you who know the importance of early morning coffee consumption by the adults and young adults in our family. We stopped just outside the first coffee shop, located approximately on deck three at the rear of the boat. It was situated in a quasi-outdoor area, which seemed desirable for the gentle breezes which are among the most effective antidotes to motion sickness.

The coffee was good and strong! Approximately 1.5 ounces of Greek coffee corresponds to two mugs of the brew in our house. With backpacks and suitcases littering the floor, and two books on the cluster of tables we pulled together, we were ready for our boat ride…until several other early morning coffee drinkers pulled up chairs nearby and proceeded to light cigarettes. Most of us are allergic to smoke, and so we dispatched a member of our party to scout for another location.

Success! Merely two flights up the cast iron steps and half way to the bow, was another set of tables, mostly unoccupied, and with no smokers in sight. The wheels on a 50-pound suitcase are worthless on exterior ship stairwells. However, we reached our goal, and arrived at a mostly covered seating area with gentle breezes of fresh air still available. The cloudy skies were noted, but did not amount to a deal-killer at this point. As an added measure of insurance, when no one else was around, a member of our party collected all of the ash trays scattered across the surrounding tables and hid them, in an effort to make this section of the starboard side appear to be a non-smoking section.

It worked like a charm. A retired couple arrived and navigated through our luggage sprawl to find a nearby table and enjoy the fresh air with us. It was delightful for about an hour until the winds shifted and approached speeds that would have been hilarious, if the consequences had not been so devastating. One member of our party made at least two trips to the bathroom, making wardrobe adjustments from the plethora of luggage beside our feet to fend off the cold. Despite traveling with multiple changes of clothing, the other four of us—thinking of June and July in the Mediterranean when we packed—simply did not have the resources to remain on the outside of the ship with gale force winds coming head-on from the South.

Like a team, we picked up five backpacks, four carry-on bags, a large man-purse filled with camera and computer equipment, the Bible, and a novel, and marched indoors. Each doorway on the ship had a threshold rising up approximately four inches—as ships are known to have—and for which wheel-based suitcase manufacturers have not found an ergonomic workaround. We perambulated the ship, jostled our way down the interior stairwell; did it again; returned to the stairwell, and repeated steps one and two yet again. The only thing more shocking than the number of seats and sofas on this vessel, was the number of occupants already in place!

There were couples using table sets arranged for four, and families occupying seating clusters for larger groups, but with copious amounts of luggage—like ours—strewn about. One member of our group (without the heavy suitcase in tow) traveled a couple of levels up, and spotted a table with six chairs that we had somehow not noticed on our earlier lap. Heartened, the rest of us climbed back up the flights of stairs and claimed an ideal inside placement for the remainder of the trip…until a nice man with black pants, a white dress shirt and a turquoise bow tie, nearly as broad as his gleaming smile, informed us that we had inadvertently entered ‘business class.’ It was obvious to everyone—including us at this point—that we did not have the cache’ of business class travelers, and so we retreated to the stern in hopes that the southern winds were blocked and the second hand smoke was manageable.

Finding this the case, we watched the islands pass on either side and the sapphire blue water churn  by the propellers, spreading like a glorious wake in our path. The views were great, and the chill was blocked, even if there was still the persistent smoke in the air.

An hour or so later one of the children returned from a trip to the bathroom with an added walk about, to announce that there was a table inside with five empty seats. And it was only two flights up stairs and near the bow!

Peace+
Furman