People who ask about our cruising life seem to think we don't carry food onboard, and that we just catch fish everyday while cruising. Truth be said, we seldom catch fish.  We do not have enough room in our little fridge cooler to store all the catch, so why waste them? Our rule is to catch what we can eat within a week. We actually despair when we end up catching a very big one, like the over-a-meter long yellow fin tuna in Solomon waters. That was a bloody mess on deck and we couldn't even keep it all. But this size of Mahi-Mahi is okay for us.

While at anchor somewhere in Vava'u, Tonga, we were watching some locals walking around the reef at low tide. Out of curiousity, we went over to ask what they were looking for. They were very eager to show and teach us how to pick some sort of edible seashell. They even taught us how to cook and extract the meat out. We were to bang it very hard on a hard surface and the meat will pop out. So off we went to collect a few golf ball sized shells. I cooked them like escargots in the boat. Lots of garlic!! They were oh-so-delicious, but our galley was a mess afterwards. Remind me to get a few of these next time I need to vent off some anger.

Here in Samal, the Daval gulf is a source of food for the locals. Sad to say, I think it is overfished and the locals who cannot afford to buy bigger boats to go further offshore have to contend with fewer and smaller sized catches. But at low tides, you can still catch or pick some edible food without having to own a boat. Here are some pictorial summary taken by my sister-in-law.

After the catch, a beach cook out!!

They do sell these at the public market. They pick shells and seaweeds at low tides. When the tide comes in, they catch those that float in with the tide, like the tiny fish they use for making briny sauces, or the jelly fish they can pickle and eat.