"Twas many moons ago", said the ancient mariner, eye gleaming bright.... ok, actually it was just over seven years ago that we set sail from the Canaries on board the Ocean Wanderer, destination the Caribbean.
The first few days were a bit choppy, you know the score, thirty five knots gusting forty five, pretty much on the nose, and it was making life in the forepeak rather uncomfortable. I remember being bounced from the starboard bunk, up to the ceiling, over the lee cloth, and back down into the port bunk (which fortunately was empty).
It was about this time that the one and only cafetiere got broken and it was a bitter blow indeed.
For the next two weeks we relied upon that granule stuff, but it wasn't the same. I started to wonder if there wasn't some sort of alternative that the wit of a sailor could put together, starting with using paper kitchen towels, which were advertised as being strong even if wet, as a make-shift filter.
Without wanting to go into details it is fair to say that results were disappointing, with the result tasting rather too much of wet paper.
However it made the arrival at St Lucia all the sweeter to know that the next day we could say goodbye to the instant imitation.
Of course I didn't expect the breakfast area of the hotel to be overrun with swarms of cockroaches, but ah! that coffee tasked good.
Updated: an interesting article about coffee on today's Guardian here.
