Happy Birthday Anadi!
Tomorrow October 7th is Anadi's birthday.
So by the time you read this, it will be the actual day...!
And we are celebrating it here, on Gozo, the little island where he spent many happy summers, mainly in the sea it seems!
I love the energy of this place... It is light and happy, quiet and sunny... Dusty fields with the prickly pear, dry stone walls and aqua turquoise sea - almost wherever we turn...
This morning we looked at a map!
Sharp intake of surprised breath... We rarely do this...
Anadi wanted to show me where he had swum and leapt from rocks as a child, a place called Xlendi....
We ran up the road and Anadi had a phone call from his sales manager Richard which needed attention, and so I went off for a reccy of the harbour, as I know their phone calls can be lengthy...!
When I returned, all was resolved and so we continued on our way, arriving in Victoria, the capital of Gozo...
In the centre there is a wonderful Citadel standing magnificent and silent... The steps leading up invited us in, but as we were on a journey elsewhere and very sweaty, we decided to wait to look inside for another visit...
We ran on, and after nearly 10k (on Anadi's watch - I had run extra along the harbour!) the road started to drop down to the bluest azure sea....
Passing a group of four, they asked 'it isn't too hot for you?'
'We are used to it' I replied, 'we love the sun'
'Ahh, you love the sun...'
Xlendi is a very beautiful bay... There is stretch of sea between the rocks... A restaurant is situated there, and there are steps leading down to the sea - 'it's changed so much' Anadi exclaimed. 'This used to be only rocks, no one came here, and we would clamber down, jump into the sea and swim across...'
The other side of the bay we could just see a tunnel in the rocks... Anadi told me that the nuns used to come down through it, to bathe, many many years ago...'
He told me how he used to climb up the tunnel that they came down, then clamber up, and leap from the rocks into the sea below... From very high up, I have now seen!
'Shall we swim across then...' I said...
And so we swam across the stretch of sea that Anadi last swam in thirty four years ago. It was warm and blue and glorious in every way...
We reached the other side, about 150 metres away...
Anadi started to clamber onto the rocks towards the tunnel...
'I don't like clambering on slippery rocks, and I don't like tunnels' I laughed... 'I will swim about here...'
After awhile Anadi appeared high above me.... 'I used to jump off there' he said, pointing to a very high place... To avoid landing on rocks, he would have needed to hurl himself out, having had a 'run up' to it...
'I'm not doing it now'! He said 'I was completely barmy then'!