Camping with Uninvited Guests - Blog Post 1

Hard to believe that it has been just over six weeks since we left home for our annual camping trip to Michigan’s UP. It does seem to have become a tradition, a week at one of my favorite state parks. This year we were back at Bewabic, which is between Crystal Falls and Iron River, eight miles or so north of the Wisconsin border (as the crow flies).

Funny how last year’s camping trip was cut short by a day due to a certain kidney stone. This year’s trip was delayed by a different sort of invasion. 

You may remember (or you can click this link to refresh your memory) that before we set off on our first camping trip in the new camper this spring, that I found a dead mouse while cleaning. It caused my gentle lick-and-a-promise cleaning to turn into a full-blown scrub to the rafters. After which, since no one else showed up in the mouse traps, I was confident in success.

The Friday before we left for the UP in July, I once again hadn’t planned on cleaning top to bottom. I thought an airing out and a sweeping would suffice. Well, when I went in that morning to start packing the food, I discovered mouse droppings in one of the cupboards. Ripping apart all the cubby holes, I found more poo and freaked out! No mouse or mouse beds though, so I don’t know where they were or if they were coming and going.

So, we gathered some steel wool, duct tape and electrician’s tape and I crawled under the darn camper, crammed steel wool into every hole and crack I could find, and then covered them with tape.  

Then I vacuumed, swept, and wiped down every surface with bleach. Last we set four mousetraps in the hidey-holes, as well as in the cupboard where I found the droppings.  

Several hours later, before going to bed, I had to check them and sure enough, found a rodent squished in one of them. Set that one and was like – argh – I don’t have time for this.

Saturday morning, at 7, we left for Lifest for the day and pulled back in the driveway just about 9 at night. Of course, I had to check the traps.

Darn it if there weren’t two more victims. Argh!!!

Perhaps, at that point, I should not have chosen to name them – Mickey that first guy back in May. Followed by Minnie, Tom and Jerry. And then Mighty the morning we left to go camping.

During the week we were camping, there was only one – Martha. But the week we got home, I continued checking and setting traps, killing Michael J. Mouse and Marvin Gray. One night the first part of August, we had torrential rains, practically a monsoon. As soon as it dried up enough, I checked the camper and discovered dead Mouse-soon.

Last week, we went camping for just a few days, trapping Maurice just before we left home and Melvin the day after we got home.

And, yes, we have tried everything – moth balls all around the outside of the camper, dryer sheets wherever I’ve seen mouse evidence inside. This week we put out some poison traps six to ten feet away from the camper, but I just wonder if the whole nest of the beasts is still hiding somewhere inside. So frustrating.

At least, Hubby has been a champ through it all, disposing of their little bodies and rebaiting and resetting the traps. All I’ve done is pull them out of whatever cubby they were in and replacing them.

  But now that I got all of that off my chest, come back on Friday and read about our actual trip to the UP. Hubby, Dino and I still had a great time, even with our uninvited guests in our home on wheels.