Journal Entry – December 1, 2004 – Critters

Author: Pam

We have encountered enough critters (dead & alive) to merit a journal entry dedicated to the sorted challenges. I am sure critters will become a thread woven throughout this adventure, unfortunately. As you know, much to my dismay we had two bird visitors on board, including disturbing my beauty sleep. Since then we found a small dead fellow on the bow, he had an unfortunate crash into a shroud. On another bird note, the dominant bird in Mexico seems to be huge pelicans. They are the size of puppies and stare at you as you pass by at eye level in the dinghy. This of course always makes me wish our 4 horse power motor could go just a bit faster. Then there are the birds that make a daily game of target practice for every surface and item on deck on your boat. I spent the entire day cleaning bird _ _ _ _ off of everything in the cockpit today. So, how many points do you think they get for multiple shots at the narrow rail, I am sure it must be more points for the cushions, they are much harder to clean.

Fish? We do not have any gear or licenses yet. This may come later, we haven’t found what we are looking for and well than there is the matter of the idea of Scott cleaning fish anywhere on the boat. As I have said, fish innards, blood and Scott could be a messy prospect. I rather like the idea of buying fresh fish from the fisherman along the way already filleted. We’ll see. Then there is the dead fish factor. We have now found two small dead fish on deck. One was definitely a flying fish, the other was not identifiable. I am sure we will have more flying fish stories, but we have now seen our first one all be it dead. What happened there, a fish with wings. They are REALLY weird looking. We understand they can cause quite a mess if they fly on board full speed into a surface. Yuck, I am not looking forward to that day. On another dead fish note, in Muertos I stepped on a dead puffer fish on the beach. Ok, that was like stepping on a dead porcupine. He was not big, but of course he was puffed up at death, he must have been scared. There was a big (14 inches) puffer fish swimming around the boat the other day, his portrait will be in the scrapbook as soon as Scott has time to transfer some pictures. Apparently, they are edible, but the preparation is very difficult. Not one I plan to learn, they are really ugly and I can/t imagine very tasty. The other night as we were going to sleep we were surrounded by a sound like the snap, crackle, pop of rice krispies somewhere in or on the boat. Ok, what is that? I asked Scott if he heard it, but I was not willing to say my first thought out loud. It sounded like a thousand cock roaches in the walls. Mind you we don’t really have walls, but in the moment that thought was lost. After some detective work and breath holding on both our parts, we determined it was the little fish swimming around the hull. We are not sure if they are killing their prey, eating off of the hull, slapping their bodies or eating rice krispies, but we really don’t care as long as it is not bugs.

Bugs? As mentioned in the last journal entry cock roaches are a big problem on boats. So far, as far as we know we have no new roommates. We have been given the “secret recipe” from a woman who cleaned boats and they apparently never had roaches. The recipe is a combination of sweet cream (yum) and boric acid (oh no). You mix this concoction into a paste the consistency of toothpaste and then put it I am not sure where yet. We have the ingredients and we will be putting up the barriers soon. In the meantime, when we go shopping it is a much more complicated process to put the groceries away. No cardboard is allowed on board, cock roaches love cardboard houses. Last night Scott sat out on the dock and copied the directions for boxed deserts on to index cards so we could throw the boxes away. While he was doing that, I was down below washing all of the vegetables in a bleach solution and rebagging them for storage. We are both hoping we don’t have an epidemic of cock roaches, but we also have been advised it is a huge challenge.

The other big bug challenge would be those that bite. While in Muertos Scott was attacked either by No Seeums or Sand Fleas, we are not sure which since we didn’t
seeum. At any rate, he got more than two hundred bites in one evening. He is allergic to many bites at once and was miserable for several days. The up side, the Lap Paz bugs don’t seem interested in him, but they love me. The back of both of my legs is chewed to pieces. Once again, we are not sure this time if they are no seeums or mosquitoes. At any rate, they itch like the dickens and don’t seem to want to go away.

Finally are the before mentioned Jelly Fish who apparently love me. They are not my friends. I got stung in Muertos several times. I have not been swimming since. However, there is a woman in La Paz who makes tailored lycra dive skins. We now both own one and I look forward to going swimming with some protection. There are at least two kinds of jelly fish. The clear ones and the string of black pearls. The black pearls wrap themselves around whatever limb they encounter, i.e. your forearm, which means multiple quite painful stings. Though vinegar helps (we have been told you can pee on the stings, though this had not been tried yet), it is still quite uncomfortable for several days.

Needless to say the last few weeks we have had many critter encounters.