Peruvian fisherman rescued after 95 days at sea survived on diet of cockroaches, fish and turtle blood
'Firstly, it was my faith in God. Because I spoke to him for many days. Because I let him know how important my family was. My mother, my brother, my children,' Máximo Napa Castro – who goes by the name of Gatón – said in an interview with CNN's Jimena De La Quintana.
Keeping hope alive wasn't easy. His morale dwindled along with his food supply. It reached a point where he thought he didn't want to live anymore.
'I even got a knife three times. Three times I got the knife because I couldn't take it anymore,' he said. 'But I told myself: Calm down, Gatón. You can do it. You can do it.'
He said he had packed enough supplies to last him a month. And after those first 30 days at sea, he was ready to head back to land. But that's when his boat's motor stopped running. He tried many times to get it to work again, but to no avail.
From there, he knew he had to ration the few scraps of food and water he had left, hoping it would last him long enough for someone to find him. But after another month or so, his rations ran out. So, he turned to drastic measures.
'After January and February, that's when I started eating roaches and birds, various kinds of fish that happened to jump into the boat.'
He said he had to hunt those birds in the middle of the night. Around 1 or 2 a.m. they would rest on top of his boat and fall asleep. Once they did, he got a club, snuck up behind them and 'pop.'
'I didn't want to do it but I didn't have a choice. It was my life.'
At one point, he even had to hunt a turtle – not for its meat but for its blood since he didn't have anything else to drink.
Not long after that, a hopeful sign finally arrived.
He was about to fall asleep inside his boat. But just 30 minutes later, he heard a loud voice screaming his nickname: 'Gatón!'
It was a rescue worker on a helicopter.
'That's when I said (to God): You did it! You did it!'
The people on board the helicopter gestured to him that another boat would arrive soon to take him home.
After about an hour, as night fell, he finally saw the lights of the boat. He was going home.
'It was something sensational,' he said.
After those excruciating 95 days, he now says he has a newfound appreciation for life.
'I will tell my story worldwide, so the world knows that God is everything in this life, that we put our hand on our chest and fill ourselves with love, give love. That is what we need here on Earth.'
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USA Today
5 hours ago
- USA Today
Untitled Art's non-alcoholic beers are sometimes boring, sometimes magic
I like non-alcoholic beer. Well, I like the *idea* of non-alcoholic beer. Being able to recreate the relaxing ritual of cracking a beer without the concern of a minor hangover or the massive calorie load of a boozy IPA is a wonderful hypothesis. But for too long, non-alcoholic beer all tasted the same -- crisply carbonated but undeniably loaded down with cereal grains that made you feel you were sipping a bowl of Grape-Nuts, not a lager. That tide has turned in recent years. Breweries, grasping for market share when America is drinking less alcohol than it has since prohibition, have turned to the NA sector for new streams of income. That's meant a rising tide of THC drinks and booze-free beers. Untitled Art has been kicking around in my fridge since back when it was 3rd Sign -- makers of a pretty good porter but shuttered due to distribution issues. In the years since they've experimented wildly across the spectrum of beers and NA beverages and eventually got bought out by Asahi. Those beers are often hit-or-miss, but they're never boring. Big, sweet dessert stouts and bold IPAs were standouts across the backdrop of contract brewing that's helped Octopi expand to a staple in package stores across the country. How does that apply to their non-alcoholic beers? Let's see what we've got. Mango dragonfruit sour: A I'm drinking this one the way God intended. After thoroughly exhausting myself inflating a raft at my daughter's pool. An extremely Dad scenario deserves an extremely Dad beer, and an NA fruited sour? That'll do. Cracking the can unleashes a wave of fruity slightly tangy aromas backed by just a little bit of lactic acid. The first sip is dense complex and rewarding. The dragon fruit is tangy; slightly sour but sweet enough to remain balanced. The hint of bile that you get from some of the worst sours out there is nowhere to be found, relieving me of my greatest fear. That bit of lactic acid in the slightly denser texture makes us feel more like a milkshake beer than many milkshake IPAs. What you get is a dense, surprisingly low calorie beer. Well, not a beer but, you know, something close to it. It clocks in at 90 calories, which is about 60 percent of a soda or a regular beer. At that value. You're getting a lot of flavor at a light beer's toll on your gut. That's a solid trade. The downside is it's not quite a hoppy refresher in the way a hop water or a light beer are. It's dense. It's more of a sipper and it's probably not the first thing I should have grabbed after modestly strenuous activity. That said, I am enjoying the hell out of it. All in all, it's not what I expected in a good way. It's not quite a sour and not quite a traditional NA beer. Instead, it is its own thing. And that's great. 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Will the fruit of a juicy IPA be able to cover up the NA scent and taste so familiar with the genre? It worked wonders with the dragonfruit sour and I have some high hopes here. Cracking the can, however, unleashes a wave of non-alcoholic beer smells. There aren't a lot of fruit or hops involved spilling out of the aluminum. It's malt all the way. The first sip is crisper and more refreshing than I expected. It's not especially fruity or hoppy. It feels a little bit more like a lager than a pale ale. However, it's crisp. The carbonation is on point and that NA taste that you'd expect from the smell coming off the top doesn't overpower you. It's still very much a non-alcoholic beer, but it's not as egregious as some of the others in the category. Still, it feels like it's missing the mark as a pale ale. You get a hint of citrus toward the end of each sip, which is nice. But you don't really get any of the hops. There's nothing here to bring you back. It feels more like a Blue Moon or a Shock Top -- more forgettable than a big bold juicy IPA you would get from a local brewery. Italian Style Pils: B I'm a little bit hesitant with this one. Italian beers, at least the big ones you find out here, are fairly minimal when it comes to hops or other flavors that could wash over the signature taste of non-alcoholic brews. They're crisp and sharp and other adjectives that stand in for refreshing-but-not-quite-easy-drinking. This pours with a lovely, lacy head that dies down to a lingering quarter inch after a minute. The smell off the top is grain and just a bit of hops. That grain is half the Grape-Nut cereal malt that dominates NA beers and half something sunnier. There's a certain brightness involved that, if nothing else, does raise it higher than similar booze-less brews. That battle carries on in the first sip. It's undoubtedly an NA beer, but it's also sweet and crisp. That gives way to a pleasant aftertaste that lands in the middle. Malty, effervescent and with juuuuust a little citrus involved to make everything a bit more complex. These powers combine to make it refreshing and poundable. It's a great warm weather beer, though it holds up well enough regardless of climate. Chocolate Dark Brew: A First thing first: this smells incredible. Cracking the can unleashes a wave of rich chocolate like you just unwrapped one of those $6 bars of cacao. It smells like a fresh mug of hot chocolate. A really nice start. The first sip is thinner than expected. The carbonation is crisp, and while this is heavier than a lager it's about the same mouthfeel as, say, a big juicy IPA. You get that chocolate flavor, but also some roasted porter notes as well. You go from sweet up front to malty before a crisp, not-quite-dry-but-close finish. It's great. What's even better is the lack of NA cereal vibes coming from it. This tastes like a full-fledged chocolate porter. Maybe not a heavy, eight percent beer, but a lighter version. If you put this in a lineup of six similar, full ABV beers and asked me to pick out the impostor I might still land on it, but that's no guarantee. This sounds like faint praise, but almost anyone who's had a bunch of NA beers knows that distinct taste and how it stands out from your regular sip. Not this Dark Brew. It's sweet and crisp and a little complex. Untitled Art went for a dessert beer and wound up making something that would be just about perfect for a fireside fall night. Even without the alcohol. Oktoberfest: B Let's finish with my favorite beer style. Marzens, festbiers, anything that's a malt bomb is gonna be an easy win for me. Can Untitled Art balance those toasty, crisp and refreshing flavors with the inherent cereal-ness of a non-alcoholic beer? It pours with a fluffy white head. It smells mostly like the real thing, though a sweet, Grape-Nut tinge settles in toward the end. While the sweetness carries through on your tongue, that NA taste is minimal. 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CNN
6 hours ago
- CNN
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While it is important for the education system to increase access to reading in schools, through libraries and other structural changes, there are also things your family can implement at home, Cremin said. Go ahead and get the audiobook or e-book if it is more accessible, and set aside phone-free time so family or friends can gather together and read aloud or beside one another, she said. If you haven't found your genre yet, try looking at the movies, shows or other cultural elements you enjoy and find books that fit those interests, Wallace said. For whatever you enjoy, you are likely to find a community around it, which is essential for building a reading habit. Whether you gather with a group of friends, engage with other readers on a social media page or follow a podcast, find the people who you can connect with through books, Wallace added. 'Reading itself is very solitary: You're sitting alone for hours on end with a book,' she said. 'But I think the process of finding books, of sharing books, of talking about books, is really another side of it.' Get inspired by a weekly roundup on living well, made simple. Sign up for CNN's Life, But Better newsletter for information and tools designed to improve your well-being.
CNN
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- CNN
celebrating-the-unsung-heroes-at-egypts-rafah-border
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