So how is the collapse of the Greek economy affecting Skyros? Well Juicy Bar now charges 3€ for a frappe but for that you can lie under a grass canopy, dozing after your Aegean dip, until the southern hills fade from gold to violet in the still-warm dusk. In Agora in the Plateia, wine is 4€ but nuts and internet are free, and so is the street theatre of night: promenaders, families, flaneurs, and children fired with World Cup fever. And bliss is free everywhere: Laughter of friends, gentleness, hearts at peace, Rupert Brooke wrote just before he died, close by, sailing to Gallipoli - he probably wouldn't have survived anyway though I like to think if he had seen more of the pity of war, as Owen did, he would have scratched his eulogy to an English heaven... The Skyrians forgave his gauche patriotism: his grave, in an olive grove, is a place of pilgrimage and his statue stands at the top of the town, best place to watch the sun rise.

It's the end of the first week of my creative writing course and it's been brilliant. Twelve varied voices, sharing and supporting - this has become a master-class and I can't wait for next week. We've worked on the terrace by the Centre, in a beachside restaurant, and in a bar by the Plateia, and everywhere has produced great writing, exciting ideas, and lashings of fun.

Garnishing the recipe for a wonderful Writers Lab: cobbled alleys arched with bougainvillea, long soft sandy beach, sessions painting and singing, evenings dancing, a nine-mile walk across the island, Vasso's legendary suppers, fabulous friendships, brazen blue skies and solid sunshine...
the list could go on... and on...