Saturday early mornings in Caleta del Vélez, there’s a market that sets up and lines the waterfront street by the marina.
Vendors and canopies pop up over rickety tables, mountains of goods are carefully laid out. Clothes, toys, sunglasses, bedsheets… and piles of food.
From my perch on the Can Opener’s shoulder and by tweaking his ears starboard and port side as needed, I deftly steered him towards the prepared meat section.
…Somehow, we still managed to arrive in front of the area targeting that evolutionary wonder, the herbivore.
Nothing against herbivores. Most are quite tasty. Living with one, however, is another thing altogether*. Quite messes up my laboriously planned 5-course meat menus.
Despite my clearly reasoned arguments in favour of daily steak tartar rations, the Can Opener was not to be deterred. He and the crew loaded up on (brightly coloured and admittedly beautiful in a still-life-in-oils kind of way) fruits and vegetables. We were planning a 5 day crossing of the Alboran and Balearic Seas and the Algerian Basin, so spoilage was not an issue.
The Can Opener mumbled something about scurvy as he passed the oranges to the vendor for weighing. Then he added ginger, packs of pasta and rice, and jars of tomato, pesto and British-mild veggie curry sauce to our satchel at the next stall (accompanied all the while by a mini lecture to me about bland food and seasickness).
I don’t need a lecture on seasickness, I know all about it. I’ll be bed-ridden for the first 3 days at sea as usual, and expect to be waited on hand and foot till it passes. Happens to the best of us.
By dint of much abuse of the First Mate’s ears, I was finally able to get him to relent and load up on copious amounts of sardine tins. Enough to get me through to Sardinia anyway.
We do not eat kibble.
–Captain Cat
(transcribed by the Can Opener)
* Note: The Can Opener is not an actual vegetarian, just a near one. He tries a lot and then fails… every time a juicy steak walks by. On passage, however, he sticks to his idealised agenda. There are no burger franchises at sea.
The Cruising Kitty 