Adam made it very clear I wasn’t to make any quips today or do anything that could delay the helicopter. Tough one because I was feeling hilarious. The morning game drive revealed plenty more Tetse flies and several fish eagles, but that was about it. Apparently there were some wildebeest and zebra on the horizon but they could have been pretty much anything considering they were so far away. My money is on James having duped us all into visiting the only African National Park that rates a pelican as its most dangerous resident.

The helicopter shoot was a big deal. A lot of pressure to get it right and it involved James and I charging about in the four wheel drive under the direction of a moderately stressed production team. A slight technical hitch with the main helicopter camera didn’t help but we finally found something larger than a pelican and drove straight into the middle of about 150 elephants. The helicopter missed this of course but luckily James was totally reassured throughout as I was behind the wheel and have been on a safari before when on honeymoon Loaded with experience to deal with virtually any situation in the African bush, James whispered to me that he had a feeling of disquiet about our predicament. Thankfully I’ve also played the Need for Speed once and we made it out just fine. Got to be in it to win it.

Elephants galore – we also got charged by a lone male elephant (we had a proper driver during this bit which was a relief) – spectacular. It was only a warning – something to do with the ears sticking out apparently. James is a specialist in ears and trunks.

Unbelievable – all that trekking about yesterday and seeing absolutely no game compared with a twenty minute drive to the airport this morning and seeing a large pack of wild dog – I wanted to get out the truck and take my chances with them rather than face the ‘vomit comet’ ride back in the Islander plane. Needless to say I didn’t (which is probably just as well) and despite my inherent fear about hopping up beside Brendan the pilot for the return journey, he did a great job and got us back to Lusaka without incident.

Great end to the trip, back at the shelter to revisit all the animals and people we had left a week ago. Whilst Cherry, Twinkle and the pups are unforgettable, it will be Richard’s story that will really stick with me. When we arrived at LAWS, he was dressed in his uniform and scrubbing out the kennels. He had arrived early for work because he didn’t want to miss us and say goodbye. He had a big smile on his face and I was really happy to see him. I wish him the very best and Sue said he had fitted in incredibly well and the other guys like him.

The last day of any trip is always a bit of a strange one. We are all pretty tired, looking forward to going home and seeing our respective families but will nevertheless invariably miss the charity we’ve been working with over such an intense couple of weeks. LAWS is no exception. The goodbye meal was so warm and genuine, the people great company and the charity is a special one. It has been a fantastic adventure and Zambia is a wonderful country. I really look forward to staying in touch with all the great people I’ve met and it’s been an absolute winner to have visited them.

Had a bit of explaining to do the other day. I’d got up with Noah for the normal 5.30am routine and as I carried him downstairs, he giggled, pointed to my stomach and said ‘baby’. Now this is hilarious when he points at my wife’s belly and says baby because she is pregnant and we’re trying to get him excited about the prospect of a little brother or sister, but this line of conversation with me wasn’t quite the plan. I had to turn things around fast – and rapidly pointed out that lions have big furry tummies like Daddy and no one makes fun of them. Noah thought this was hysterical and I’m not sure if he got the right message because Mr Tummy was subject of about 30mins intense early morning discussion and repeated probing. I was worried he might hurt his hand on the ridges of scarcely disguised muscle but he’s tough. I also managed to explain how seals and whales keep warm in the oceans. It was a morning of education. I didn’t take it personally but needless to say, I walked to work rather than drove. Noah needs to know just how tough Daddy is and a walk in driving rain definitely proves the point. Not even a lion would want to do that.

Been manic at work, got a chance to do some calls with Caroline (new vet at the practice) which was fun – trimmed a bulls feet, caesared a cow, all went well – she didn’t need me around but it was great to be out and about. Now sitting on the plane on what is hopefully the last couple of hours of a 21 hour three stage flight to Iquitos in Peru. Hats off to LAN – not a bad airline at all, still wishing economy was a couple of inches wider though (i.e. big enough to fit a lion).

 

Belen market takes some seeing to believe. It is a heaving chaotic scene of hustle and bustle and everything is available for purchase. Huge anaconda skins decorate some of the stalls, animal skins, potions are for sale adjacent to clothing and grocery stalls. It is a sprawling centre of commerce in Iquitos and bizarrely, above the meat market Amazon Cares were running a community outreach project. I’m really impressed with what Molly has set up here, she has a great team and they are doing a lot of good. A WVS team are also here which means I am just one vet of five so there is lots of work going on and everyone seems in top form. Spaying was the name of the game on the first day, a few sick animals which needed tx and a poor cat who had been bitten on the face and lost its eye. Carolien – one of the nurses, found the poor little creature and we fixed it up back at the Amazon Cares clinic in town.
 

 

Simon is our new special friend for this trip. Marc is back but Adam is in India so another member of the extreme cameraman gang has been drafted in. Simon loves the fact I keep reminding him he is extreme at every possible opportunity (there really is an extreme cameraman club) – he has just had an extreme breakfast for example and feels extremely pleased about it. He is extremely nice and is definitely an extreme addition to the gang. The only other point of note is that Lupe is working hard on his Spanish (he has a Spanish girlfriend) so he’s currently dazzling us with the odd word in the local dialect. Almost as extreme as Simon.
 

Annie (one of the vets on the WVS team and worked for the charity last year) has stayed behind from the rest of the group to come with me and the film crew. There are apparently lots of animals lined up for us to treat in a community and I’m going to need an extra pair of hands. It’s great to work with Annie again and I’m glad of the back up it was looking like I would have been short of help with everyone else (including all the local team) having gone up river to run another neutering campaign.
 

The day started with a very sad case of a sweet little puppy that was badly jaundiced. We think it has leptospirosis (a horrible disease that we vaccinate against in the UK and spread by rats) and the prognosis is poor. We popped it on fluids and started a course of medicines so fingers crossed it pulls through. It won’t be in the programme as it arrived first thing and needed treatment immediately but we’re all rooting for it.

Then the adventure began; Molly’s shelter is outside Iquitos in the midst of the rainforest. A half hour boat ride down the Amazon took us to a cluster of huts and buildings and a yard comprising about twenty dogs. All the dogs were happy, healthy and in great form and clearly adore Molly as they leapt and cavorted about us. A few dogs we rescued from the meat market the other day were also there, trying to adapt to their new surroundings and receiving the appropriate treatments. It’s a very honest set up – the whole place almost got washed away last year in torrential rain so has been rebuilt in stages with more sturdy construction.

There wasn’t much for me to do from a veterinary sense, one dog had bad eyes which I had some medication for, but the shelter animals look great and it was more about filming an introduction to the programme than about surgeries. After a thorough look around, we headed back to Iquitos to check up on the hospitalized animals at the shelters city clinic, went on a reccie for a shoot later in the programme and then back to base.

Simon had it extremely tough today. He couldn’t bring his second pair of extreme shoes with him on the trip out – they wouldn’t fit in the bag. I think to be part of the extreme camera man club; you need to always be prepared by having two pairs of shoes with you for any extreme situation. Simon even has a ticket on his bag saying he is an extreme cameraman – prepared and poised to film anything extreme at extreme short notice. He is adapting to these extreme conditions – where we all go around with just one pair of shoes each day – extremely well. He also didn’t get lunch today – extremely hardcore. We’re all struggling to be anywhere near as extreme as Simon but we’re doing our best. Fingres crossed none of us slow him down.

Marc the producer had to sort things out with a boat this morning so Simon, Molly, Nathan (aka Lupe) and I were left to our own devices to sort out the days events. After a humbling lesson in strength whereby a Peruvian boatman lifted my 40kg bag onto his shoulder with one hand, we headed over to an animal orphanage run by Gudren – an immensley likeable but slightly crazy Austrian. Gudren started out by setting up a butterfly farm with the idea of exporting rare and exotic butterflies around the world. Due to some slightly detailed Peruvian export legislation, this didn’t quite pan out as expected so with an inate love of animals and the Amazon, Gudren took it up on herself to take in the animals rescued from the illegal trade in endangered and exotic animals. She releases as many as she can back into the wild and her home is an idyllic cluster of wooden buildings, set amongst towering trees and thick Amazon vegetation. A large variety of rescued monkeys – many endangered species and all exotically coloured, swooped overhead as we got the grand tour and introductions to some of the more familar residents.
 

 

It was a fantastic day and I´m sold on the great work Gudren does. She just cracks on with little outside support and is utterly fearless in her defence of the animals. I did a couple of ops to help out – removed a mass from a Macaws wing and extracted a couple of teeth from a monkey – which went well. The Macaw was a handful and it gave Gudren a nasty bite which she took without complaint (last year one of the Macaws fell into her lake and was attacked by the resident 2m caimans – Gudren jumped in to rescue it regardless of the danger – so not a lot phases her).
 

The really big deal about today though, wasn´t the giant anteater, the jaguar or treating the wound on the tapir – but the fact that Nathan declared he needed an assistant. Suddenly he had been promoted from soundman to director/producer and it was a lot of work for him. Especially because he had to carry a lot of stuff as well. Simon and I promised to petition Marc for his cause so fingers crossed…
 

There is going to be some radio silence for awhile as we are about to hit the waters for a few days and visit some communities upstream – will update in a little while.

The boat trip got delayed by a day because we had an emergeny call. Sabrina was in pain, she was riddled with mammary cancer, hot and painful to the touch and she was having trouble getting about. Ethically this is was a really tough one. The surgical challenge was huge – a mammary strip, spay and mass removal under field anaesthesia – on an old dog with probably aggressive adeno-carcinomas. On the other hand, she was bright in her eye, wagging her tail and her owners clearly loved her dearly. She was a very sweet dog as well. I had Annie with me which was a massive plus because having assistance with the anaesthetic was going to be key.

After a bit of pondering and debating, we decided to go with it. The surgery took nearly 3 hours – it was really tough and all was going well until about 7hours post surgery. Sabrina just wasn´t recovering as I´d expect so Í decided to have another look and make sure I hadn´t slipped a ligature. She also had horrible bloody diarrhoea. Annie gave me a hand and on the second operation, the ties looked fine, but there was a lot of free blood in her abdomen and she seemed to be oozing from everywhere. Whether she has an underlying condition, I´m not sure, but she seemed to be clotting so I tied absolutely everything again. When I left this morning at about 4.45 her colour was a bit better but she is still not quite right. I just hope the whole ordeal hasn’t been too much with her.
 

I’ve petitioned for an extra cabin on the boat so Sabrina is coming with us. We are all depserately rooting that she pulls through.

Amazon amazing. Apparently risk of pirates minimal as crew armed and on 24hr watch. Big relief.
 

Community days going well, removed seven three inch maggots from dogs back!

Sabrina just passed away. Really sad. It was just too much.