We made it up to Paxos and found a nice anchorage with a good hold. Good enough to wander to shore. The first thing we spotted was a bunch of scooters and a phone number to call to rent them. This sort of thing is Kryptonite to a Skillman. We called the number and soon Nancy showed up with three keys and three helmets.
Nancy is a bad-A. Her dad owns a rental shop that’s been on Paxos for, well, forever. She helps run it now, but before she did she went off to school and studied mechanical engineering. This girl knows her way around motorcycles. Of course I started asking her if she watches MotoGP, hoping I’d find her to be an avid fan. I’m always looking for chicks who dig bikes. And Nancy’s eyes lit up when I asked. She said her dream would be working in a MotoGP paddock. So I instantly adored her.
I guess I talked too much about my over-the-top adoration for Valentino Rossi so when we made a mid-ride pit stop back at her shop, she brought out a trademark Rossi yellow helmet to switch out for my white one. She knows her stuff.
Our mid-ride pitstop was due to the fact that I was so happy to be on a bike, even if it was a scooter, that I forgot that I was on a puny moped during some thrilling S turns. My mind was on MotoGP and my body was on a scooter. Not a good mix. I surpassed the poor scooters lean angle and slid out–on the pavement–in flip flops. The bike was fine and so was I, even though I took the slide going pretty fast. The choice in footwear though, that was the big mistake. And my the tops of my toes were left somewhere in the middle of the S turn.
We took the bike back to Nancy so she could get any of the oil out of the airbox, and off we went again.
Later when Nancy’s dad heard I was a Rossi fan, he insisted on coming by to collect our helmets and keys so he could show us the 46 sticker on his helmet. He didn’t speak a lick of english but we both spoke Valentino Rossi fluently so we got along just fine. He even recounted a recent race, all in greek, and I knew EXACTLY which race he spoke of just watching his hand gestures.
Paxos, like Antipaxos, has the same remote paths and trails boxed in by rock fences. Only this time we didn’t get lost or wander too far. It was a beautiful island to explore even if the price was the tops of my toes.
My scraped toes should serve as a public service announcement that flip flops are not proper riding gear.
Although, I’ll probably do it again anyway. Everything I do around here is done in my flip flops.