One of the things I’d dreaded happening on A B Sea was having a mouse move on board. Why? Aren’t they cute furry creatures? Well yes they are when they’re pets. But when they’re making a home in a hard to reach space between the seating or sole (floor) of the boat and the hull, then they become a hazard.
Even without addressing the fact that they leave unhygienic rodent droppings and wee in their nest and on the galley and other surfaces, they can seriously mess with the boat in other ways. Think chewing through wiring. I think that and then think no power to something important or worse, a fire. Plus you’ve got the headache of finding the break in the wire even if it doesn’t catch fire and you can understand how concerned I was when Baz pronounced one morning that we had a mouse.
Actually, after some research, and remembering the size of our two long deceased Australian pet (Fatty Rat and Ratty Rat) rat’s poo size, I reckon what we had was a rat.
How to get rid of it though?
It wasn’t possible to squeeze into the tiny space our rodent seemed to be calling home. So that meant either poison baits, a cage or a traditional spring trap.
Poison baits were out for two reasons: Firstly the little rodent would end up seeking out water and possibly die somewhere else out of reach so the boat would end up smelling of dead rat until its little body had decomposed. And that takes a long time. If you meet me ask me about the time I accidentally let a mouse free in our car and it got trapped in the front somewhere and died. So Baz had to drive to work every day with this thing decomposing. It was during summer and when he put the air conditioner on he just got blasted with odour of dead mouse. It’s funny now …
The second reason for not choosing rat poison is that we’ve heard the little animals die very painful deaths and that’s not something we wanted to subject it to.
So off we went to the hardware store in Kaş and found out we had a choice of two scary looking implements. Well, the first one was a *spring loaded cage that snapped shut once the rat entered. The only problem with that option was we didn’t know where we could let the rodent go once we caught it. We certainly didn’t want to release it where it at the marina where it could get onto someone else’s boat.
We reckon we’d picked the little darling up at the marina on the last night before our contract with Kaş Setur marina ended on the 31st of August. We know that because we were anchoring in the bay next to the marina (from the 1st of September) and Baz heard a faint rustling that night and early morning when he was in bed. He hadn’t heard that noise before and the rustling stopped every time he raised his head to listen for it. Whatever it was, was watching him from inside the boat.
So, the only option left to us was the spring loaded traditional type mouse trap. Except this looked like it had been built to deal with the biggest hairiest of rats. It was *a metal rat trap, larger than ones I’ve seen and even had serrated teeth like edges. I personally never like killing animals but this at least would be quick and hopefully painless.
We armed the thing that night with a blob of peanut butter (a substance that even the sneakiest of rodents couldn’t carry away, unlike a piece of cheese). We placed it by the port stern toe rail and tied it with a piece of string to the boat. We’d seen how high this contraption leapt as it snapped shut when the hardware store guy had given us a demonstration. We wanted to be sure if we’d caught the rat, but we wouldn’t know if the rat trap was at the bottom of the bay.
A happy ending
The following morning Baz reported that he hadn’t heard any rustlings and when we checked the trap it had been sprung and was lying upside down on the deck. We turned it over to discover that there was nothing there. Except a soggy blob of sun-melted peanut butter, seeping onto the deck.
Either the rat had set it off and scampered away. Or it had set it off and jumped back as the trap shot into the air. And as it jumped, it had fallen into the water.
We set the trap again that night but the following morning there was no evidence of a visit at all, as the trap was as we’d left it.
We came to the happy conclusion that the rat had jumped into the water and we liked to imagine that it had swum to shore. Rats after all are known for their ability to swim.
Dinner at Smiley’s
One of our long term subscribers and a Patron of ours, Henrik Thystrup, had kindly donated us a generous amount through our PayPal button on our website front page, with a note to enjoy a good dinner and decent bottle of wine. Our new contract was beginning at Setur Marina, Finike on the 1st of October and we wanted to visit Smiley before we left Kaş. This was the perfect opportunity.
We both got fairly dolled up and headed on down to Smiley’s. It was wonderful to see Kaş town thriving with no lockdown restrictions and lots of international tourists. As we approached, Smiley saw us and gave us both the biggest hug! His wife Serpil was also there. They’ve both lost weight since we saw them last time and I have to say Serpil looks like a model! And it was great to see her so bubbly and happy. Under Serpil’s watchful eye, the service was quick and the food and wine were wonderful, as always.
Henrik, it was a wonderful evening, thank you for your kind and generous gift which allowed us to treat ourselves.
Kaş Jazz Festival
Kaş marina is usually host to an annual Jazz Festival and everyone was excited because this was the first one since the beginning of the lurgy that shall not be named. It was to be held in front of Migros supermarket and a large area was cordoned off to allow for a huge and flashy stage, sound and lighting equipment, drinks areas and of course, spectators.
Our friends Mike and Elaine who live on Spicy Lady have the opportunity to get front row seats (of the back of the stage), because their yacht is berthed at the beginning of C Pontoon, where the stage was situated. And they invited us over each night.
It was great, with different jazz bands playing all sorts of styles and it was fabulous to see a good crowd who seemed to enjoy themselves. The thing I enjoyed almost more than the music was the constantly changing light show. Seeing the multi-colours reflected in the water, and the aqua and purple laser lights dancing across the yacht masts along pontoon C, was a treat for my artistic eyes. And we had some great conversations with Mike and Elaine and other friends who joined us.
If you’d like to see what I’ve just written about, then check out this week’s video here.
Next week, we visit Kekova, a place I always love visiting. Until then, I wish you health, wealth, courage and a healthy dose of wisdom, as you take the actions to bring your dreams to life.
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