Ponies in Lesotho, Big Hole, Augrabies and on to Kgalagadi.

Augrabies Falls National Park

Ponies in Lesotho, The Big Hole, Augrabies and on to Kalagadi Transfrontier park

14 to 22^nd March 2011

After a fabulous run in the hills and a wealth of game including Eland, we farewell the red cliffs of Golden Gate national Park and arc around the kingdom of Lesotho, to enter via the capital Maseru. The border crossing is a breeze and I have to smile at the official’s total disinterest in the fact that, as a family, we are travelling on passports from three different countries. Maybe this will come back to bite us later though! We avoid Maseru and head instead for Malealea, about an hour towards the foothills of the mountains, where we are welcomed by the “Gates of Paradise Pass” which indeed provides a vista that is a taste of what is to come.

Horse trek in Malealea

Our delightful hosts allow us to camp next to one of the chalets as the campsite is full with “Contiki-type” over-landers and we are able to use all the excellent facilities. This place is a gem, calm, clean and colourful with a local band and choir performing each evening. We waste no time and give in to the girls pleading to go riding and set off on a two day trek the following morning. Our Basutho ponies are perfect with docile temperaments, which makes me feel a little bit happier about cow-girl Zara being on her own. The first descent and river crossing, however, had even Ilda and me gulping back a hint of anxiety, but the girls handled it, like the ponies, in their stride.

Zara with locals on overnight camp

The experience is unforgettable with panoramic views of Drakensberg-type mountains, numerous clear river crossings and lots of opportunity to interact with the locals as we pass through their villages. Sadly my Sotho is limited to “Dumela” which gets us an enthusiastic response anyway. We overnight in a mud hut with the locals and Margot and Zara defy linguistic barriers and are building forts and dams with the local kids in no time at all. A stroll around the village is rich for the cultural experience; an elderly ‘gogo’ inhales vigorously on her snuff and outlines the production process; another ‘mama’ leans over her black pots which steam with delicious concoctions which Margot pleads for instead of our stodge; herd-boys return home with their bell-ringing goats and cows and, while the women labour, the men chatter idly under a brush shade that serves as a chicken roost at night.

Bushman's painting

We return home the next morning via some exceptional Bushmen paintings which incredibly are about 23 000 years old and depict beautifully the life of these first settlers of Southern Africa. Back at Malealea our hosts invite us to braai with them and a rainy rest day is perfect for the girls to get back to school.

Basutho boy

Basutho hut at overnight camp

Back on the road we elect to head back into SA and west to Bloemfontein and get there late thanks to continual roadwork which plagues SA roads right now. The stop is worth it though and I am relieved to pick up my credit card and we visit the world renowned Oliewenhuis Art Museum which houses a fabulous selection of South African art. After a good coffee in the gardens we continue our sojourn west towards Kimberly where we camp for the night.

Margot showing distances covered from Mseleni to Kimberley

Kimberley Big Hole

An early start sees us first in the queue to visit the Big Hole which is the biggest manually dug hole in the world. The diamond rush in the late 1800’s triggered SA’s industrial revolution and De Beers is still today one of the leading diamond producers world-wide. The 800m hole is impressive and a viewing platform gives us a bird’s eye view but it is the short movie in a spanking new theatre and the underground mining experience with noise and blasting included that gets the girls vote. Margot and Zara now know that the 4-C’s of cut, colour, clarity and carat is what diamonds are all about. Good luck boys!

School at Golden Gate

We follow the sun traversing the Northern Cape and then following the mighty Orange River (a tributary of which we had crossed on our ride in Lesotho) to Upington. This is a part of SA that I have not visited and conjures up memories of military call-ups in the bad days. The country is arid but cultivation is rich along the river with miles of vineyards and is now Irish green. We refuel (at nearly R10 per litre!) and push on to Augrabies national park, so named by the Khoesaan people for whom “Aukoerbis” meant “place of great noise”.

Looking down towards the valley of the Orange River

This is familiar territory for me having been here in my varsity days when a white water kayaking trip nearly went badly wrong and watching the incredibly powerful, surging brown water made the hair stand up on the back of my neck

Augrabies Falls- 600 cumec's

The falls are staggering in their might and signs of the recent 6700 cumec flood abound with trashed viewing platforms and walkways and driftwood perched high and dry. Half the campsite is closed thanks to the flood carnage but we find a grassy patch under some trees where school can happen once again. Ilda does magic with the school programme and miraculously keeps the girls attention. They revel in the swimming pool with the outside temp at 35degrees Celsius and I enjoy a sunrise run along the Dassie trail with lots of rocks and river crossings and spectacular views of the gorge. A large troop of baboons prevents me getting to Arrow point but the walk onto Moon Rock for the sunrise is spectacular.

Orange river gorge at sunset

We once again squeeze everything into the Pathfinder and drive due north. The scenery is stark and so it is a relief to arrive at the Kalagadi Transfrontier Park which straddles Namibia, South Africa and Botswana. Rains have been good and so the grass is long which makes for difficult game viewing but excitement abounds in the campsite and there is talk of numerous cat sightings. We rise early for a spectacular sunrise and are treated to a large herd of soaked Springbok and sightings of the majestic Gemsbok with his sword like horns. Signs in the park point to camps nearly 250km away which reminds us of the enormity of this amazing wilderness. Tomorrow we dive to Nossob camp on the Botswana border about 150km away and from there on to Namibia.

Mighty Orange river at sunset

Sani Pass top

Africa travels start: (8 March to 13 March 2011)
Pietermaritzburg to Underberg and camping on the banks of the Umzinkulu River.
Ascent of Sani Pass into Lesotho and lunch at “the highest Pub in Africa!”
Traverse of Lesotho
Golden Gate

Tubing on the Umzinkulu River

Only moments after we had squeezed the last ammo box into the car did we notice engine oil dripping out the back of the car! Our oil container was firmly packed under a ton of baggage but there was no other option but to dig it out of the bowels of the vehicle and remedy the problem. This we did and we expected to find our medical kit swimming in engine oil but to our surprise there was no leak! Some skillful diagnostics from Ilda located the leak from oil container number 2 nestled discretely in the wheel hub on top of the roof and dripping vigorously onto the roof and running back to be deposited in a glutinous puddle at the rear end of the vehicle. Problem solved!

First Campsite on the Umzinkulu River

We set off from Maritzburg bidding farewell to Grandpa/Dad and headed west towards the Drakensberg Mountains. We set up our first camp in intermittent rain and were delighted with our new awning which provided superb shelter for us as we dined on roast chicken and sipped ice cold beer from the fridge, loaned to us with a multitude of other bits and pieces, from Guy and Leigh Henderson (thanks so much Guy and Leigh). The next morning dawned bright and sunny and, after fighting off our first animal attack in the form of red ants, that had actually bitten through the ground sheet of our tent and my mattress, we started with an invigorating plunge in the fresh Umzinkulu River before the girls sat down to their first morning of school on the road! What a setting; clean brisk flowing river, rolling meadows and rich green hills drifting off towards the spectacular mountains of the Drakensberg. (Thank-you Mark and Belinda). We couldn’t have asked for a better start to our trip with a wonderful horse ride, tubing down the river, lots of swimming and some schooling. It was a great chance to test all our gear and then we set off up Sani Pass to really test things.

Sani Pass Zigzags

What a drive it was. The pass is spectacular, climbing to 2865m up a rocky, serpentine, zigzagging, white knuckle rollercoaster that left us exhilarated and euphoric that our Nissan Pathfinder had passed this first big test. The bends are aptly named things like “suicide corner, reverse bend and ice corner” which I was relieved to see after the deed.

We then enjoyed lunch (a superb hot smoked trout) in “the highest pub in Africa” and set up our tents at the local backpackers which was very comfortable and even had our first hot showers in a few days.



A stroll amongst the local Basotho huts was both heartbreaking and joyful. The poverty and squalor is extreme with spartan stone huts, mud floors, no electricity and no hope of growing anything. Heat is provided by burning dried cow dung or heather type brush wood. However the girls played briefly with children making toys from bottle tops, scraps of plastic and molded clay and got a smile and then became engrossed in a game of “mancala” with a number of Basotho women and Margot helped preparing vegetables. It is this sort of interaction that we hope to nurture on our travels. The girls asked to stay on there! We were entertained that night to a thunderstorm that was palpable and dramatic, so much so that one felt the thunder vibrate through ones body and the lightning was blinding and prompted a bit of tent shuffling by the girls. We also got to meet our first “real”over-landers in Ruth and Ian who had driven from the UK all the way down the west of Africa in “Search of Thunder” as their blog suggests. We got some great tips from them and I’m sure they would have been delighted with their dose of thunder.

Sani Pass Basutho Hut

Girls playing "Mancala" with locals

Inglis Shadows

Basutho tribesmen

After a brief walk along the cliff edge at Sani pass we drove off into the interior and were awed at the vastness and beauty of Lesotho. (Ilda pronounces this Lesotto as in risotto!) The road remained epically rough and we were very happy to be in a 4x4 with good clearance. We passed Thaba Inhlanyana (Black Mountain) and the highest point in southern Africa at about 3300m and continued over two passes of over 3000m. The drive was rough but dramatic and the locals friendly but the begging became tiresome, probably a symptom of their desperate circumstances. Interesting sights included a ski resort called “Afri Ski” and a massive and ugly open cast diamond mine which, with water and hydroelectric power, make up most of the GDP.

We dropped off the highlands down an “Alpes d’Huez” type descent that the Tour de France would have been proud of and entered another world of lush pastures and ‘civilization’ and bought a bucket load of peaches from urchins on the road side. We slipped back into South Africa through a border post which demonstrated fantastically our inflated burocracy with large numbers of “officials” lounging about and one doing the crucial job of stamping our passports. A short drive took us to Golden Gate national park, so named for its dramatic sandstone cliffs under which we are now camped. Today was Sunday but school continued in a sense with a magnificent walk under the cliffs and discussions on rock strata and types and the girls using clay to make toys and draw ‘Bushman paintings”.

Echo Ravine- Golden Gate

The thunderstorms have persisted but fortunately predictably in the late afternoons so we have been prepared. Tomorrow we drive back into Lesotho with plans to do some pony trekking and visit the 200m Semonkong waterfall. From there we head west with stops at the “Big Hole” diamond mine of Kimberly and then on to the Orange River and Augrabies falls.

Earthquake, leaving Mseleni and Africa calling...

It has been a tumultuous week. Frightening, desperate, sad, happy, anxious, stressful, exciting. The 6.1 New Zealand earthquake had as its epicenter our little village of Lyttelton next to Christchurch. We listened in numb silence and shock to the dreadful news and watched in horror the grotesque images of the beautiful town we know so well. Buildings and lives shattered monuments and cathedrals no more and we wonder if it will ever be the same again. And yet out of bad comes good and the rescue stories, community spirit and incredible work done by my Emergency Medicine colleagues and other medical staff in Christchurch demonstrates the courage, resilience and determination of the true Kiwi. We felt relieved to have missed it but somehow sorry not to be able to offer help and to experience this incredible New Zealand spirit. Our thoughts are with you.

Here far away in Africa our lives too have taken a turn. I am now unemployed having completed my year at Mseleni hospital in far north Kwa-Zulu Natal. We packed up our Park Home into trailer and station wagon and drove off into the sunset! It was with mixed emotions that we left. My farewell from the OPD/ED staff was deeply moving with lots of singing and prayers, moving words, chips and coke for Africa and a massive cake with “Fair well Dr Inglis” written on it. The staff showered us with gifts and my words of gratitude were choked with emotion. Ilda and the girls were able to sing in French in response to their beautiful Zulu song. It has been a spectacular year in which we have felt deeply privileged to have been part of this rich community and culture. We have learnt so much about life, about wildlife, about medicine, about Africa and I feel more a part of this country than ever before. Numerous excursions into game parks, diving in clear warm water, camping on beaches and on mountains of the Rift valley, historical tours to Zulu war battlefields, trout fishing with my Dad, school old boy gatherings, running the Comrades, canoeing down beautiful rivers, trips to Cape Town to see our family, wonderful visits from friends and family from around the world, the girls running barefoot, collecting bugs and getting excited about stars. This year has exceeded all our expectations. Then there was home schooling in which Margot and Zara thrived and Ilda excelled and my hospital work that made me realize how much more there is to do and know.

Take my last few days in the hospital. This 55yo man is dragged into OPD by his family. They tell me he has vomited up a lot of blood. He is sweaty and ghostly pale. We place large iv cannulae and hear that he has been a drinker. I suspect oesophageal varisces and, as if to confirm this, he throws up another jug full of bright red fresh blood. I feel desperate as we lack the usual special throat tube or drugs to stem his bleeding and a surgeon is over 2 hours away. We give him blood and, as a compromise, I pass a urinary catheter down into his stomach, blow it up and apply traction in the hope that this may stem the bleeding. It amazingly seems to work and he is still alive when I return early the next morning. Enthused, I refer him on again to the surgeons who remind me that the mortality for this condition is nearly 100%. Despite this we book transport and prepare him for transfer. But the stats prove right and soon thereafter another bucketful of blood and he breathes his last. That same night I suture up a scalp. He has been assaulted by the “community justice” with a “knobkerrie” (a stick with a hard rounded end) and has an extensive occipital laceration. He is conscious and only requires sutures but the process is awkward because he is unable to roll over because of the handcuffs that tie him to the bed. In the morning I am desperate to get away to the morning rounds but one more folder catches my attention. Green folder means obstetric and ignore it at your peril. She is 36 weeks pregnant, a little restless, BP 160/110 and has leg swelling and protein in her urine. Pre-eclampsia is a dire obstetric emergency and we treat her and transfer her urgently to the Women’s hospital over 2 hours away.
My last day at work is memorable too. After routine rounds we start in the operating theatre. An elderly man who has smoked all his life has a rotten big toe and no pulses in his leg. His vessels are irretrievably clogged and we amputate below the knee. Even without tourniquet only one vessel spurts briefly, confirming his wrecked circulation. Then on to the ED, where we have a young man who is restless and short of breath. A chest x-ray shows a massive heart and we are able to confirm this on ecg and Ultrasound scanning. We place a needle into his anterior chest over his heart and straw coloured fluid gushes forth. We drain off two litres of pericardial fluid and start him on TB treatment. He feels so much better that he asks us to discharge him! And so I finish at this delightful hospital, hang up my stethoscope and walk out the door.

We hope to be back. Right now we are surrounded by ammo boxes, camping gear, piles of Mefloquine and Garmin’s “Tracks for Africa” as we prepare for our nearly 6 month voyage around southern and eastern Africa. The all important “carnet” for the car comes this week-end and so we hope to set off early next week. The plan is to head up to Weenan for a touch of 4x4 tuition and then on up to the Drakensberg and into Lesotho via Sani Pass. From there we will go west to Namibia, follow the coast and then turn right at Angola. Then through, what in my childhood was a war zone, the Caprivi Strip, and on to Botswana. After that as far north as Rwanda and then back home along the east coast via Tanzania and Mozambique. It all seems a little chaotic now but things seem to be coming together.

Carpe Diem

Inglis Family

CT Angiogram on friday, canoe marathon on Saturday

Our flip-flop-jandal collection now covers a large section of our fence. All picked up from our local beaches. The sunflowers have been fantastic.

You know one thing I love in life is variety. Too much routine is tedious and surprises are great. Anyway, a routine GP visit to my longtime varsity mate Mary Mac last Friday, gave me a wee bit more variety than I had bargained for. My medical insurance will end when I finish my job here and I thought it timeous to go for a “general check-up”, run a few bloods and, because I had had a few niggles in my chest (not exercise related) and a father who had had a triple bypass, do an exercise ECG. It was all a bit of a jaunt until I saw Mary’s face looking somewhat pale and gazing at my ECG with distinct depression of 3 of the ECG leads. Before I knew it I was lounging in the plush waiting room of a cardiologist and soon thereafter had had an echo (normal) and was on my way to the CT suite. The CT was fine and I held my pulse obediently below 45 until, that was, they gave me contrast which was somewhat unpleasant and felt vaguely like someone was trying to throttle me and shove a red hot poker up my anus at the same time. This had the not surprising result of pushing my pulse up to 75 and rendering the CT void because of movement artifact! Anyway all was repeated an hour later with a different contrast and my heart and vessels on 3D reconstruction looked pristine and the cardiologist has put it all down to ‘athletes’ heart which I suppose I can be proud of. While all this was going on we also fitted in Yellow fever jabs for our imminent Africa trip and Ilda managed to have a pretty sever allergic reaction to antibiotics she had just received for an ear infection. Anyway to celebrate my warrant of fitness we set of for the Drakensberg to take part in a canoe marathon.

The girls Kids club trip to Sodwana was a fantastic success. We saw a few Loggerhead turtles, had interesting talks from a turtle expert, sand-animal competition and lots of snorkelling. All on our doorstep.

There had been quite a bit of rain in the mountains and the river was flowing strongly. The Umzinkulu is a beautiful river running clean and fast and so it was a real pleasure to be joining Guy Henderson, a long-time school and varsity mate, for this fantastic 2 day marathon. We had a near perfect first day negotiating some fairly impressive rapids and surveyed with interest the canoe carnage that littered the banks. Day 2 continued well for us and we had fun shooting weirs and some tricky rapids. A momentary lapse in concentration nearly meant grief for us about 5k’s from the end when we found ourselves tightly pinned on some rocks and had to abandon ship and swim for it. Luckily the canoe remained intact and we were able to finish well up in the field which is no small achievement for us veteran paddlers with about half a dozen training paddles between us. Of course my true satisfaction was doing a real stress test and finding my myocardium well up to it. Who needs CT?

On the work front, I have just tendered my resignation. Not through any dissatisfaction but just because the time is right to move on. I think I’m scared that if we stay here another year then we might still be here in 20! New adventures await us and we leave for a 6 month trip around southern Africa at the beginning of March. Our plan is to go as far as Rwanda spending a month there and then back down the east coast back to SA. We fly to France on 22^nd August.

This is the snake that joined me in the pool one morning. I think that it fell out of the Mango tree above. Certainly gave me quite a fright and I was happy to release it through the hospital boundary fence.

Work is definitely seasonal here and the summer rush is gaining momentum with wards bulging and nurses grumpy! From February to September last year I didn’t see one case of Malaria but almost as the rain came so did the Malaria. We have had about a dozen cases with one infant death. Certainly not a disease to be taken lightly. Snakes are out in abundance and our wards are full of swollen hands and feet. Fortunately most of the bites are from Puff adders which tend to only cause local tissue damage and, for most, a few days on the ward settles things. We did have a death a few weeks back though. It was probably a Boomslang, which is a lethal snake whose venom causes bleeding. This poor chap apparently waited about 6 hours for transport at a remote clinic and bled out soon after his arrival at hospital. Anti-venom for that snake is only available from Johannesburg, a 2 hour flight away, and will only be released and flown down on positive identification of the snake!

The other thing that I have had a run of on my ward is badly beaten buttocks! Community justice is strong here and if someone does wrong he is dealt with by the community and then handed over to the police. These guys come in severely injured and I have had to take three of them to theatre recently to debride inches of rotten flesh from their buttocks which will take weeks to heal. The fourth chap wasn’t so lucky and his severe beating caused massive muscle breakdown leading to rhabdomyolosis and renal failure. His lungs didn’t like our vigorous fluid management and heart failure followed his kidney failure with his creatinine soaring to over a 1000. The day I had him organized for transfer to our referral hospital there were no ambulances and miraculously I managed to get him choppered out first to ICU and then to Durban for renal dialysis. I’m not sure if he survived.

Margot and Zara drawing water at a local well in the Lebombo Mts. overlooking Swaziland. So good for us to experience what the locals have to do everyday to get their water. It was the most delicious water too.

Speaking of trauma, we have witnessed a number of horrific motor vehicle accidents recently. South Africa has more road deaths over a holiday week-end than New Zealand does in an entire year. Not too surprising though with the shoddy state of vehicles, drunk driving, incredible speed and phenomenal overloading. Driving back after Christmas we were on the scene of a 2 car head-on collision which must have happened shortly before our arrival. It was sickening with bodies hanging out of the wreckage and even before emergency services had arrived, a sizeable crowd of spectators had converged. What alarmed me was my reaction. To stop and help or drive on? Although this is what I am trained for this situation was different. Firstly, by stopping in an uncontrolled environment like this my family would have been at enormous risk; both from other cars and also from looters hanging around. Secondly, I was desperately ill equipped. At the very least I needed gloves and probably goggles, but not just one pair, as one would need to change gloves after each casualty I touched. (HIV has been transmitted in this way!) It all looked futile and I was relieved to see lights and hear sirens approaching as we eased away from the scene. Call me a coward but family first.

Anyway, enough for now and after my call tonight a blissful ten days of holiday await us starting with a train trip to Cape Town. We can’t get enough of this beautiful country.

Swim Training with the bungee from the fence. I last about 15 minutes max! The pool has been fantastic and we all live in it!

Needlestick, Caring for a king and Mango mania

Oh, Sh#@%&t!........ Elephants have been here.

Last week I got my first needlestick injury. It was quite surreal and you just don’t believe that it has happened. HIV carriage rate here is about 30% but probably around 50% for those in hospital. We spend our lives avoiding needlestick injury and other hazardous exposure by double gloving, disposing of sharps in the sharps containers and never resheathing needles but, like the butcher who eventually chops off his thumb, we eventually get nailed. I was flushed with enthusiasm having just opened up and controlled my first solo ectopic pregnancy. Her belly was full of blood and after a short rummage around in the pelvis I located and plucked up the offending fallopian tube. It was a mess. The tube had ruptured at its insertion into the uterus and as such had the appearance of a lunar crater. It was massive and bleeding briskly and needed wide clamping. I had only just done this and was about to insert my first haemostatic suture when my instrument slipped from my grasp. The prick was hardly painful and despite the double layer of latex I knew I was done. The tell-tail trickle of blood within my glove confirmed all and I felt a sickening feeling. ‘Shit, I’ve pricked myself’. I looked anxiously at Jo doing the anaesthetic and asked her what this woman’s status was. ‘Pretty sure she’s negative’ she said paging through her folder. ‘Yes!’ I could have hugged her across the theatre drapes! A repeat HIV test the next day confirmed her negativity and I was spared a month of gut churning antiviral “PEP” or post-exposure-prophylaxis. During my year here there have been about 4 doctors taking PEP and they are not a pretty site with diarrhoea and vomiting and feeling miserable. Only this week a medical student had a needle from an HIV + patient dropped into his leg by a nurse and was catapulted into a month of PEP and all its misery as well as 6 months of anxiety that he won’t seroconvert and become HIV+.

Impala preschool

On a more positive note, this week I looked after a Zulu king or Inkosi as they are called. King seems to be used fairly loosely here and there seem to be a number of them around, but nonetheless it was an honour and a privilege to look after such a mighty patient. He was a calm and pleasant man looked after meticulously by his nursing sister wife and his dehisced and infected open cholecystectomy wound did very well.

Waterfall in Highmoor in the Drakensberg















Daily mango collection at home

Margot said last week that she is ‘mangoed out’! We have had an extraordinary crop and our three massive trees in our front garden haven’t stopped dropping fruit. They fall day and night and frequently we are awoken by loud crashes on our tin roof. The lawn is littered with them; they squelch between our toes, fall in the pool and lie in heaps fermenting in the warm African sun. We have them for breakfast, lunch and supper. We’ve had them raw, frozen as ice-cream, mango fool, mango juice, mango chicken and this week, Ilda made a dozen pots of delicious mango chutney. The hospital staff at large, make frequent sorties into our garden and raid our trees and lawn by whatever means possible. They come with long poles, sticks, wire contraptions and nets to secure their share of this delicious succulent fruit. That’s another thing I love about this land of milk and honey; the abundance of fruit and the way that it belongs to all and everyone. They’re not our trees, we’re only baby-sitting them for a short time. The granadillas are already turning a fresh yellow so the next course is nearly ready.

I have just worked all of the New Year period and it didn’t live up to expectations. Not that I am complaining. We got to have some good down time, swims with the girls, braai on New Year’s Eve and generally not hauled out of bed too much. I had expected the worst and had spent the 31^st preparing our little Emergency Department with boxes of chest drains and endotracheal tubes for the inevitable carnage that was to eventuate. After mopping up the department and clearing a number of minor cases, I was happy to get out of there and slipped into bed at about 10pm. I argued that New Zealand had already celebrated New Year some 10 hours before so that I wasn’t being totally pathetic and besides, Ilda was already sound asleep! The first call came at around 02.30 and I excitedly thought that the action had begun. “I have a case for you Doctor’. “Yes what is it?” “A rape case, an 80 yo gogo (grandmother)”. I felt sick and despondent. My worst call possible and so far from what I expected. The nurse also had a chap who had blown up his hand lighting fireworks “crickets”, whom I spent some time with in theatre on New Years day. We took three of them to theatre that day, all of whom required finger amputations of varying degrees. New Year’s Day passed in a blur of the usual spectrum of pathology with a paucity of road trauma until about 9pm when half a dozen came in from a three car pile up. One driver was so drunk that he hardly knew where he was so I was delighted to take blood from him for the police. The injuries were not too bad; a lacerated knee, a fracture-dislocated hip and an impressive facial laceration like a lightning strike down the middle of the face with bits of fractured nose peaking out. I was certainly happy to see my colleagues on the morning of the 2^nd.

Below: Zara with various bugs and creepy crawlies!