The west Cumbria fishing family saved by social media

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The west Cumbria fishing family saved by social media
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The McAvoy family, who fish out of Maryport in Cumbria, turned to Facebook to survive the pandemic.

When fisherman John McAvoy goes to work, he is gone for days. After two nights at sea and precious little sleep he returns to sell his catch. These days the first in line are the local customers who, following the siren call of social media, saved him and his boat when Covid threatened to sink his livelihood. As part of a series focusing on west Cumbria, BBC News has been finding out how.

But Covid put paid to that odd market symmetry, halting the transport of seafood to buyers in France and Spain and shutting restaurants. Were it not for John's daughters, and their youthful affinity with social media, that might have been the end of the line for him. Graeme Elsby, from Crosby, Merseyside, does not exactly make the 140-mile trip especially, but every visit to his caravan in Lorton, about 30 minutes from Maryport, involves an outing to the quayside.

"People had never tried angler fish or monkfish or John Dory," he says. "Even brill and turbot, it's like high-end restaurant fish. People have really opened up their taste buds to things like that."

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