Deserted Diners

In 1991, six of us chartered our favourite yacht, Sea Tramp, and sailed over to Alderney. When we arrived on Saturday afternoon after a seventeen hour crossing, we were eager to tuck into any food more substantial than sandwiches and Cup-A-Soups. We picked a restaurant near the harbour and grabbed a table. The restaurant was divided into several rooms. Our room contained our table and a larger table which had been empty when we arrived, but was soon filled with a party of eight as we enjoyed our starters.

The main course arrived, along with several wine bottles. As the conversation continued apace, we quickly got through all the wine with plenty of food remaining. We looked around for our waitress in order to request more, but no one was around.

At this point we noticed that the larger table was now empty. We hadn’t seen the people leave, and they definitely hadn’t finished before us. Their starters appeared to be only half consumed, and our envious eyes spotted that their wine bottles were still full.

While waiting for our waitress to reappear, we caught some flashing lights through a frosted window. Perhaps a disco had started up and the other diners had disappeared to take a quick peek? We were left hanging for another five minutes before our waitress reappeared, looking a bit flustered.

She explained that a rather large lady among the group of eight had got up to visit the toilets, and on the way back had collapsed in the corridor, blocking it completely. No one had been able to get past until the ambulance arrived and took her away. The other diners had followed as well.

We listened intently to the waitress’s story, establishing that the lady’s condition was serious enough for it to be unlikely that her companions would return to finish the meal. When the waitress left the room, we thought that enough concern had been shown, so we swapped our empty wine bottles for their full ones and carried on.

• Sailing