A flotilla of Doctors

We were lounging on a sunbed by the pool at the Yalis hotel when we started seeing lots of little boats coming across the water towards the port.  They all stopped for a while to let the stragglers catch up and once they were all together, they set off in a nice straight line heading towards Patitiri.  There were about 30 boats and we were rather confused at first as to what was going on.  We came to the conclusion it was the arrival of the infamous Doctors that we'd been hearing about for the past few days.  Apparently every year a group of top doctors in their field go to the smaller greek islands for an 'open house' appointment system to check on the health of the residents ....and this year, Alonissos was the lucky island.  All the appointments were quickly booked and by the queues at the medical centre and the gym, they were kept rather busy.  The pay off for this was arrival by boat to music, coloured flares and general speeches etc to welcome them.  Saturday night then saw a meal for 200 (although there were only 50 doctors!!) on the waterfront of Patitiri followed by dancing by the local group and two expats. This went on long into the night as musicians then played and other dances took place.  Unfortunately a lot of us left rather earlier than we would have liked to as the following morning the Alonissos Challenge was due to take place with 10k & 15k walks and a 30k run.