La marinera habla con la capitana antes de salir del puerto.

The (female) sailor talks with the (female) captain before leaving the port.

Breakdown of La marinera habla con la capitana antes de salir del puerto.

• con: with
• antes de: before
• salir: to leave
• hablar: to talk
• .: period
• del: from the
• el puerto: the port
• la marinera: the sailor
• la capitana: the captain

Questions & Answers about La marinera habla con la capitana antes de salir del puerto.

Why is it la marinera and la capitana instead of el marinero and el capitán?

In Spanish, many job titles change form depending on whether the person is a man or a woman.

• Marinero / marinera

  • marinero = male sailor
  • marinera = female sailor

• Capitán / capitana

  • capitán = male captain
  • capitana = female captain

Because the sentence is talking about two women, it uses the feminine forms with the feminine article la:

• la marinera (the female sailor)
• la capitana (the female captain)

If they were men, the sentence would be:

• El marinero habla con el capitán antes de salir del puerto.

Why is the verb habla and not hablas or hablan?

The verb habla is in the third person singular (he/she/it talks) of the present tense of hablar.

Conjugation of hablar (present tense):

• yo hablo (I talk)
• tú hablas (you talk, singular informal)
• él / ella / usted habla (he / she talks; you talk, formal)
• nosotros/as hablamos
• vosotros/as habláis
• ellos/as / ustedes hablan

The subject here is la marinera (she), which is third person singular, so we use:

• la marinera habla = the sailor talks / is talking

Why is there no subject pronoun like ella in the sentence?

Spanish usually drops subject pronouns (yo, tú, él, ella, nosotros…) when the subject is clear from the verb ending or from context.

• La marinera habla… already tells us who is doing the action.
• Adding Ella would be grammatically correct but not necessary:
  
  • Ella, la marinera, habla con la capitana… (possible but sounds more marked/emphatic)

So the natural Spanish sentence is simply:

• La marinera habla con la capitana…
  and not
• Ella la marinera habla… (this sounds odd and redundant).

Why do we say habla con la capitana and not habla a la capitana?

Both hablar con and hablar a exist, but they are used differently.

• hablar con alguien

  • literally: “to talk with someone”
  • implies a conversation, both people talking
  • most common in everyday Spanish

• hablar a alguien

  • literally: “to talk to someone”
  • often sounds like one-way communication (giving a speech, scolding someone, calling out to someone)
  • more limited and less common in casual conversation

In this sentence, the idea is that the sailor and the captain are having a conversation, so:

• habla con la capitana is the natural choice.

What does antes de salir literally mean, and why is salir in the infinitive?

Antes de salir literally means “before leaving”.

Structure:

• antes de
  • infinitive (salir, comer, hablar, etc.)

We use antes de + infinitive when:

• we say “before doing something”
• and the subject is the same as in the main clause.

Here, the same person who habla is the one who is going to salir (leave), so we use:

• antes de salir

If the subject were different, you would normally use antes de que + subjunctive:

• La marinera habla con la capitana antes de que el barco salga.
  (The sailor talks with the captain before the ship leaves. – different subject: el barco)

Why is it del puerto and not de el puerto?

In Spanish, the preposition de + the masculine singular article el always contracts to del:

• de + el = del

So:

• ❌ de el puerto
• ✅ del puerto = “from the port / out of the port”

This contraction is obligatory in standard Spanish; you cannot write de el as two separate words before puerto.

Why de in salir del puerto and not another preposition like desde?

The verb salir normally takes the preposition de to express where you are leaving from:

• salir de casa = to leave (the) home
• salir de la oficina = to leave the office
• salir del puerto = to leave the port

Desde also means “from”, but it emphasizes the starting point of a movement in space or time, often with a destination:

• El barco navega desde el puerto hasta la isla.
  (The boat sails from the port to the island.)

For the basic idea of “leaving a place”, Spanish uses:

• salir de + lugar
  so salir del puerto is the normal and most natural expression.

What is the difference between marinero/marinera and capitán/capitana?

They refer to different roles on a ship:

• marinero / marinera

  • sailor, crew member
  • works on the ship, but is not in command

• capitán / capitana

  • captain
  • the person in command of the ship

So:

• La marinera = the female sailor (a member of the crew)
• La capitana = the female captain (the one in charge)

Can I change the word order to Antes de salir del puerto, la marinera habla con la capitana?

Yes, that is perfectly correct and very natural.

Spanish is quite flexible with the position of time expressions. You can say:

• La marinera habla con la capitana antes de salir del puerto.
• Antes de salir del puerto, la marinera habla con la capitana.

Both mean the same. Placing Antes de salir del puerto at the beginning just emphasizes the time frame a bit more (what happens before leaving the port).

Why do we use el puerto (with el) and not just puerto without an article?

In Spanish, we normally use a definite article (el, la, los, las) when talking about a specific thing:

• el puerto = the port (a particular, known port)
• un puerto = a port (any port, not specified)

The sentence suggests they are about to leave a specific port the speaker has in mind (maybe it was mentioned earlier, or it is obvious from context), so el puerto is used, and with de it becomes del puerto:

• …antes de salir del puerto.

If you wanted to say it more generally, without a specific port, you might say:

• antes de salir de puerto (much less common, and would often sound incomplete without context)
• or rephrase the sentence in another way.