My friend John is a photographer and was planning to take some photographs of the fishermen of Corfu at work. The various photographs would afterwards be the subject of his new exhibition.
He had invited me along on this photographic sea journey and asked me to arrange the details. I was very enthusiastic, as I had never tried fishing at night before. I happily arranged our journey with another friend, who was a captain of a gri-gri, which is a convoy of fishing boats, a large one at the head, followed by smaller ones.
We started our fascinating journey from Corfu Town, four of us altogether, and our destination was the traditional fishing village of Petritis, in the south of the island.
We reached the village in the early afternoon and caught sight of the boat which was waiting to take us on our adventure. It was called Panagia (Our Lady). The captain was in a hurry and suggested that we should embark as early as possible, so as to catch the sunset.

And so we did. Nothing had prepared us for the magnificent picture of the early evening sea. The sun painted the waves with golden, red and purple colours. The boat sailed softly and the breeze caressed our cheeks. When the captain appeared and treated us to a glass of ouzo, I thought that I was already in Paradise.

The work started though when the captain ordered the crew to slow the engine down and to launch the smaller boats into the sea. Each one of them was equipped with a large lamp. The small boats are known in the language of fishermen as ‘robots’, and they create a long line. The fish are attracted to them, as they connect the light with finding food.

The ‘robots’ were sailing in the distance as we waited in the main boat, which had sunk into darkness. The evening sky was clear and millions of stars were lit like small candles over our heads.
While we were waiting for the fish to be attracted by the robots, we had the rare chance to hear the captain talking about his various sea journeys. All these stories have something of the magic of fairy tales and the feeling is strengthened by the imagination of everyone who may hear them.
Time passed by dreamily, until we were told that it was 3:00 in the morning. The robots had surely done their job and it was now time for the crew to take over.

The youngest sailor took another boat, also equipped with a lamp, and started sailing slowly, directing the fish towards the lights of the robots.

He extinguished the lights of each robot one after the other, until eventually the whole crowd of fish surrounded only his own boat.
The main boat, the so called kaiki, started moving in a circle around the small boat and the crew threw the nets slowly over the fish, creating a sort of bag, which trapped the fish. The small boat with the last lamp alight eventually moved away from the net, which was now full of fish.

We were very excited to see if it had been a good day for the fishermen and we realized that it had been a success by the smiles of the crew. When the bag reached the boat, everybody was busy filling big basins with ice. They used big buckets to bring the fish out of the net and then put it straight into the basins.

My friend John was very pleased and kept excitedly taking photographs. The boat started sailing back towards the village at dawn. The captain and the crew were very satisfied, since they had returned with many nets full of fish. They were tired but happy and were looking forward to resting, before their next fishing trip.
On the way back, after having left the village of Petritis behind, we did not stop talking about our brand new experience.

John hopes that his photo-exhibition will be ready very soon and invites you all to share with us the memories of a beautiful and unique sea journey.

By Kadiani Kapelaki, Ichthyologist