A land of scurrying lizards and the silent hawks who hunt them. Of thrumming bees and butterflies over the heavy-scented herbs. Our taxi driver has about 100 hives, he says. He hopes for 30kg of honey from each, flavoured with wild lavender in early summer, wild thyme later in the year
We first came to Serifos, in the Cyclades, 30 years ago with Ina, Henri’s mother, who recently died. We are here for healing sun and sea, for a fond goodbye and to see the island in flower.
The hills are dotted yellow with a close, ground-hugging gorse and every kind of dandelion. Its seed gathers in soft, swirling piles along the roadside, like down from a busted duvet.
Metre-tall thistles line the paths by the sea, exploding purple heads humming with bees, competing with myriad butterflies and iridescent beetles. There are flowering rock roses everywhere, wild peas, daisies and golden salsify seed heads waiting to be blown all over the island.
The air on the hills is scented with cooking herbs: oregano, thyme, fennel, a rock-hugging rosemary. Others carry an oily fug close to cannabis.
Stunted, stubby wild lavender is also alive with every sort and size of bee, a constant urgent call. The steep walk to the beach sounds of water trickling to the sea, its path vibrant green and hot pink with oleander. The houses are white, doors and windows the best blue, and small domed chapels dot the hills.
Ina would have loved it here now, before the high sun burns the thorny bushes to a silvered-brown, though like many Danes she also thrived on heat.
Our walks are dotted scarlet by roadside poppies, tight clumps of hot colour, fresh heads every day; intense short bursts to be replaced by new blooms. I’ll collect a few of the dried pods for seed for the summerhouse. Poppies in remembrance of Ina and a long-ago island holiday.
Allan Jenkins’s Plot 29 (4th Estate, £9.99) is out now. Order it for £8.49 from guardianbookshop.com
