My most special times would’ve been in Majorca with [on/off boyfriend] Jake [Hall]. I love it there, it’s so beautiful and very romantic. Jake has a family home in Puerto Portals. We would go three times a year, every year. His family also had a boat, so we’d have dinner and then lay and watch the stars.
Where’s the most romantic vacation place you’ve ever been? Photo Gallery
The rougher the sea became, the merrier I was. There is nothing more calculated to make a sea-sick person feel worse than the exaggerated gaiety of a companion who feels fine. We had stopped over in Petite Couron in France to discharge more tanks before setting off for New York; the Valvata was now only half-full of cargo and the morning tank temperatures took us less than an hour. That then gave the chief mate ample time in the day to ensure we had plenty of revolting tasks to fulfil: the more revolting the better as far as I was concerned. Cleaning out and tidying up the paint store was a particularly foul choice for someone in Starling’s state. The poorly-ventilated place was thick with the fumes of lead paint and kerosene; assorted oily messes slopped about in half-full paint tins. I rearranged the 20-litre drums of deck paint, stacking them in front of the doorway while I cleaned out behind the shelves, raking out clods of greasy gunk and slopping the mess on the deck in front of Starling, who was sitting there groaning. After a while, he dived towards the doorway, couldn’t get past my wall of paint drums, turned in panic and heaved all over the paint brush shelf. I tut-tutted: You better clean that spew off those brushes before the storekeeper sees them, I said. Otherwise, he won’t be happy.
