Halfway To Hollywood: Diaries 1980-1988 (Volume Two) (106 page)

Read on for an exclusive extract from Michael Palin’s
Travelling to Work: Diaries 1988–1998

I’ve just got up, washed two pairs of socks and pants and considered what to wear for the day. As we have shots that are continuity with last night, I have to settle for the trousers I’ve worn since leaving London on Sunday morning and my second shirt of the voyage.

The sea is calm, my cabin, which is one of the more comfortable, has two beds alongside each other and a shower and loo. A porthole looks onto the deck and a lifeboat hangs above.

The journey has been fast and furious until now. Yesterday we were up and filming at first light in Venice – we left the city yesterday evening.

I still find the nights a problem. Last night I slept six hours, but that was with the help of a pill which I took in a panic about two. I swear not to take them again except in extremis. They do so little anyway.

Occasionally the realisation that this whole project is supported on my shoulders and demands not just my survival but my wit, energy, exuberance and enthusiasm quite terrifies me. It is going to be a supreme test, and now, only onto my fourth day and feeling low on all levels, I just can’t contemplate the same continuing for two and a half more months.

But I’m determined to pull this off. Failure is unthinkable.

It’s nearly one o’clock and clear skies outside over the Saronian Gulf. We’ve just completed the quite dramatic navigational feat of the passage of the Corinth Canal – a man-made gorge it took us an hour to pass through.

Feel in good spirits today after a long sleep.

Phone Helen after breakfast and, despite the crew crouching and filming every word, it is one of our better phone calls and Helen sounds clear and very pleased to hear me – and surprised too. I don’t think she’d expected a call from the ship. These boat journeys will, I think, be a necessary interlude between periods of intense rush and activity.

The crew of the boat are treating us nobly, though I suspect they could turn ugly if they’re not enjoying themselves. Today I got up in my
Adriatica
T-shirt, which pleased them – I was promptly given a sailor’s hat.

It’s hot outside now – the scrub-covered mountains of Greece are all around. Glad of the air-conditioning on the
Egitto.

This boat trip has been restorative. I’m eager and receptive to places – especially glad I stirred myself from bed this morning to run into Heraklion. I don’t suffer, as yet, from seasickness or homesickness.

Fears about my adequacy for the journey persist. I don’t think now that I shan’t make it, as I did that gloomy first morning on the
Egitto
– my worries now are what I shall make out of it.

My style is friendly, humorous and laid-back. It isn’t best suited for revealing things about people – whose right to privacy I respect, as I would want them to respect mine. How much of the time should I be acting?

Slept fitfully until finally rising at 6.20 to watch us approach Alexandria.

A thorough break with Europe, which I suppose could have been disturbing, but which I find exhilarating and energising. So the day dazzles and everything, all the hard work and the rushing around from location to location and city to city, encourages and stimulates me.

All we need at the end of our first week is sleep. We’ve filmed well and interestingly on the whole – though it
is
hard to get people on camera to be as easygoing and informative and anecdotal as they are off.

Sour taste of tourism at the Pyramids, and back to film two interviews in the bar of the Windsor
¹
(where many stars of Egyptian theatre and opera gather!). Conscious of asking easy questions, not probing enough, being almost too respectful. Always after the interview I think of the one question I should have asked.

Seven o’clock at the Red Sea Hotel – the silence outside on the straight, empty avenues is quite a shock after Cairo. So is the hot water, even though it’s only a shower – no bath since Venice. The room is quite characterless and depressing, as is Suez. Can’t wait to get on a boat tomorrow and get moving.

This morning we completed various shots in and around the hotel and I didn’t have to go out. As in New York City, one has to be fit and strong to go out into the streets of Cairo, and a two-hour lay-off in the morning to write cards and ring the office was much needed and appreciated.
Wanda
is over 50 million in the States now. [The film
A Fish Called Wanda
had been released in the USA on July 15th.] Terry J starts
Erik the Viking
in Malta on the 19th.

The journey by taxi to Suez was pretty grim. The heat, dust, traffic and fumes of Cairo for the first half-hour were as uncomfortable as anything I’ve experienced so far on the trip. Once out of Cairo we were in desert – relics of war, barracks and endless rubbish tips.

The hotel is dry and we’re all meeting at 7.30 to seek out a place for beer.

1
The Windsor Hotel. Eccentric city-centre hotel. The air-con unit was noisier than the traffic outside. ‘I now know why they laughed at me when I’d asked for a quiet room’ (
Around the World in Eighty Days
).

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