For Silkie, Thumbelina and Skye Smith it was the perfect resort. The staff was attentive and the food was good.

Their favourite activities were napping and making catty remarks about the other guests.

The resort was Avocado Boarding Kennels and Silkie, Thumbelina and Skye were three beautiful Birman cats belonging to cat fancier Morag Smith.

Avocado Boarding Kennels was previously owned by veterinarians Dr. Maureen Ware and husband Dr. Jan Cieters, but was recently taken over by animal lover Audrey Pope. recently met with Mrs. Pope and some of her clients which included on this day eight dogs and five cats.

?Dr. Ware and Dr. Cieters approached me and said that they were looking for someone to take over the boarding facility,? said Miss Pope. ?They wanted someone who had the same sort of ethos about animals that they do.?

Miss Pope got to know the two veterinarians through her own nine cats, and also through her extensive work with the Bermuda Feline Assistance Bureau (BFAB).

As a full-time job, Miss Pope previously worked at the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS) formerly the Bermuda Biological Station for Research (BBSR) doing fundraising.

?I always wanted to work full-time with animals,? she said. ?But I could never figure out how to do that and make a living, so when this came along I jumped at the opportunity. It was time for a change.?

The Avocado Boarding Facility is in Pembroke at the location of the old Hannover Veterinary Clinic across from the Transport Control Department (TCD).

We spoke with one of her clients, Winston, a black and brown Shih Tzu belonging to Katie Terceira. Winston indicated that he liked the large fenced in yard to run around in, and he also liked hanging out with his buddy, Tiger, a hyperactive Boston Bull Terrier, but Winston didn?t think much of the spa facilities.

Suspecting that the reporter was really there to give him a bath, Winston spent most of his time dashing through the undergrowth in the yard.

However, Tiger, belonging to Digby Smith, proved himself to be a ham, and spent most of the time mugging for the camera.

Costs at this boarding facility range from $15 a day for a cat or a teeny-weenie dog to $25 and up for a much bigger dog.

Although Winston was placed with another dog to run around with, the dogs are generally exercised separately to avoid any spats.

?I have priced myself below the other facilities,? said Miss Pope. ?The beauty of the place is I can let the dogs loose in the garden. I go in and play with them.

?They usually burn off enough energy in there. Some of the dogs I will take over to the park for a walk and some of them don?t like to be left alone. I have one dog that I always take for walks in the park. If I leave him in there he will sit there and whine.?

The cats stay indoors, but have their own entertainment room, where they hang out, laze and chase toys.

Miss Pope keeps the kennels as sanitary as possible. She has a pooper-scooper for the yard, and the indoor kennels are on a main sewer line.

?If they go in the garden I have a big composter and it just degrades down into ash,? she said. ?The poop goes in the top. It never needs emptying, it just seems to disappear. It is great because it doesn?t smell.?

In terms of health, clients are required to sign a waiver allowing Miss Pope to seek veterinary care for her boarding animals should it be necessary.

?A lot of people don?t even think about boarding their pets,? said Miss Pope. ?They are worried that their pet might spend weeks stuck in a little cage with little exercise or attention.

?Here, I have nice big cages, a play area for cats and a yard for the dogs. I am trying to approach this as a pet owner as well as a business owner.?

Being self-employed has been a challenge for Miss Pope, but she said it has been worth it.

?It has been a lot of hard work,? she said, ?but I am really enjoying it.

?It is actually nice to get out of bed in the morning and know you are going to work with animals. That is my favourite thing to do, feed and work with animals.

?The business side of it will come. It is early days yet. I am enjoying the animals.

?Each day is different. You never know what is going to happen depending on what animals you get in.?

Miss Pope said her learning curve has been very steep over the last couple of months.

?I have learned to be very patient,? she said. ?I find humour in the animals. Some of the things they get up to are very comical.?

As she has only had the facility for a couple of months, most of her clients are left over from the days when Hannover ran a boarding facility as a side to their veterinary practice.

In terms of new clients, she has proved herself to be a go-getter, literally.

Because of her work at BFAB, Miss Pope has become good at reuniting lost cats with their owners.

She often remembers the pets in the lost and found section of , because she puts so many pages of newspaper down for her guests.

?My friend at BFAB called me and said she was bringing in kittens for me for the weekend,? Miss Pope said. ?She was going away. She had been feeding a cat that had been coming around because it was starving.

?She didn?t know what to do with that cat while she was away because she didn?t want it to go hungry.

?She was thinking of bringing that one in too. She had phoned the SPCA and they didn?t have any information about the cat.?

Thinking that she might put a found advertisement in the newspaper for the cat, Miss Pope went to see the woman with the stray cat.

?I almost didn?t go because it was pouring with rain that day,? Miss Pope said. ?When I got there, she said, ?here he is?.

?Right away, I knew I had been in the paper, but I didn?t have the issue anymore, so I telephoned for the telephone number.?

The cat Miss Pope was thinking of had been advertised in the newspaper on several occasions.

I called the owner up and said, ?does he have a white tip on the end of his tail?? and he said, ?yes?, right away.

?It did this cute thing where it sat in his hands. It did that right away when it saw its owner. The cat was very skinny, but it was a happy ending.?

The owner gave Miss Pope a $100 reward, which she donated to BFAB, and the newly found cat became one of her newest clients.

Miss Pope still maintains a close relationship with BFAB and often fosters kittens before they are put up for adoption. She also finds homes for many of them.

Recently she took care of a wild mother cat and kittens.

?I caught the mom, and I spent a lot of time down here with her,? Miss Pope said. ?I tamed her, and found a home for her and her kittens.

?It is quite nice to do that. The best people to adopt cats to, are people who already have cats.?

For more information about the Avocado Boarding Kennels telephone at 292-3643 or e-mail avocadonorthrock.bm.

Unfortunately, the facility is completely booked for the Christmas season.