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Today John and Paul arrived in Athens, along with Cynthia and Julian Lennon, Jane Asher, and various other members of the Beatles entourage. Note in the picture above that Julian is holding Paul’s hand, not his father’s; this, of course, is the relationship that would inspire “Hey Jude.”
The Beatles had hired a yacht to take them around the Greek islands to look for one to buy, but due to bad weather the boat would not arrive for three days. In the meantime they hung around Magic Alex’s family’s house, soaking up the sun and doing whatever it is that Beatles do in their time off.
Alex had claimed that his father’s government connections would help The Beatles in their quest, because “because many islands did not have the right certificates of ownership and were subject to government restrictions,” says Wikipedia. I have no idea whether this was true or not; Alex talked a lot of mish-mash, but he did occasionally make himself useful.
In reading up on Alex today, I learned that later in life he went into business as a security consultant with, um, less than stellar results. I’ll leave you with this brutally deadpan paragraph, again from Wikipedia:
The Sultan of Oman ordered six Mercedes 450 limousines [from Alex’s company] in 1977, but quickly discovered that they were not as safe as he had been led to believe. His ex-SAS bodyguards tested one of the cars in the desert in July 1977, by firing at it, but a bullet hit an emergency air cylinder, which led to the petrol tank blowing up, burning the whole car. The remaining cars were immediately sent back, with a demand to refund the money spent. King Hussein of Jordan had a fleet of cars that Mardas customised, but carried out a safety test on them with live ammunition in November 1977. One eyewitness reported that the cars could be more life-threatening than ordinary vehicles, as bullets easily pierced the armour-plating, and the thick armoured glass broke into jagged splinters when struck.