Hi everyone,

One of the great things about travelling is the characters we meet. On this occasion it is a 70 year old gentleman from East Germany called Jurgen.

Jurgen has a business making beautiful wooden toys in his home town as well as ‘joke’ toys. He is still working, selling his unique wooden toys at fairs, especially around Christmas time.

He told us he really enjoys creating new ideas for ‘prank and funny’ type toys.  He has a brilliant sense of humour….. even in his second language.

He and his wife Gisela have been sailing and motoring in the Ionian for 20 years of summers. Previously unable to travel, before the demise of the Berlin wall, once liberated they have loved travelling around these islands. With the success of their business came opportunities including their very nice 38ft Princess motorboat. He drove this year from East Germany to Greece with a car full of home cured sausages, meats and of course German black beer all surrounded by dozens of frozen bottles of water to create an icebox!!.  One cabin of his boat he now calls his supermarket, the other is full of wine from a local Greek winery and the 3^rd is for them to sleep.

We first noticed Jurgen , a rounded figure with very small red ‘speedos’.  Always making jokes and being very friendly as we passed. On one occasion he called us over, to our surprise there was a massive rat caught in a trap lying on his cockpit table. Shocked for a moment and then in the next we realised it was a plastic rat. He said it was one of his joke designs…. and he had placed it on the table when the port police came by.  Port police can at times be a little officious in Greece and Jurgen had decided to have his own back when the policeman came to ask him for his boat papers.

Jurgen complained bitterly as to why he should pay anything to moor on such a ‘dirty rat infested quay’, the policeman bulked and left without Jürgen’s papers or euros!!

The quay is in fact very nice,  clean and very much free of rats!!!

Jurgen said that the rat was at its best when the batteries worked…… apparently with a remote control he could make it writhe and blood to oose out of its mouth…uuuh!   Recently he had placed it on the boats foredeck when moored alongside another boat. A fully clothed lady came onto her adjacent deck, saw the rat on Jürgen’s boat and swiftly jumped overboard into the sea. It’s absolutely true… honest.

The week before we arrived, in cooler weather, Jurgen had still been wearing lightweight trousers to go shopping in the town. He had worn some plastic slip on ‘shoes’, one of his designs which look like a Neanderthal man’s feet.  Together with a walking stick he had hobbled around town, talking to locals, complaining and discussing the problems he was having with his swollen feet!!!!

All sounds a little crazy, but we can assure you he is a very nice man, generous and someone who isn’t afraid of making a joke of life…. especially after being given only a few weeks to live last year…. an operation in the US saved his life.  Crazy or enjoying life to the full, you decide.

Photos of…….

The fake joke rat

A local fisherman and Tony looking at Jurgens feet

Jurgen and Gisela

The joke hat, teeth and feet complete with speedos.

Love to all

T and T x x x