It is June 1888 and the city of Sundsvall is laying in ashes…….again…… To be precise this is now the fourth time since the Russian Army caused the first fire in 1721. This time an accident was to blame – a spark from a passing steam boat had set a local brewery alight and the …
Author Archives: The Blue Vet
Nightshift
It is 3:45 pm and the sun has been setting already an hour ago….what better thing to do now, than starting another nightshift in the North?…. A brief glimpse at the car park of the clinic while finishing an evening run had informed me already that it will be busy tonight…. Following a shower and …
Before the snow arrived….
Never work in a location you don’t like !……. Not often enough did I follow this maxim, but luckily I have always been wise enough to make a move before settling permanently for a poor compromise. There are just too many hours in the day when you are not working and you owe it to …
A new clinic, a new team and….a new car (or something like that….)
Once again I am finding myself in new surroundings – the clinic in a recently converted industrial building houses some 60 staff, which includes this time some colleagues from Portugal. In addition to this some German colleagues are occasionally drafted in from Östersund to help out. I find it interesting to observe the dynamic of …
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Arrival in Norrland
While in my dreams still on the descend from Triglav, I am waking up just in time for the train’s arrival in Sundsvall. Not to get off here would have resulted in a time consuming detour, as the next stop would have been Östersund – 200 km to the West…. Hauling my considerable luggage down …
Triglav
” So, tell me about Triglav.” I said to Neca Jerkovic, who was living on a sailing boat in the Marina of Portoroz, while my skin was drying after a swim in the Mediterranian Sea, “I want to be up there by tomorrow afternoon….”. This probably requires a bit of background information…. Triglav with nearly …
Slovenia
It is the last day of August and the weather in Bavaria is dismal ……….but looking on the bright side, the COVID incidence figures in most European countries remain low and with the borders open, I have decided to take full advantage of the geographical uniqueness of the Alps – just three hours drive away, …
Heading North – again…..
I am sitting in a train heading from Stockholm 400 km further North along the Gulf of Bothnia to Sundsvall, a town of less than 60 000 inhabitants that had based its wealth on timber. Despite its limited size, the place has a busy veterinary emergency clinic which is taking in small animal patients from …
To write for a living ?….
It is 5.30 in the morning and its done…… With the coffee machine working overtime and our Vizsla snoring peacefully on the floor next to my desk, I am sitting in front of 71 pages plus eight appendices of an advisory job, which I had taken on to try my hands on a completely new …
Gran Paradiso
It was still early in the morning and the sun was about to rise over Punta Feuillaz in the East. A thin layer of snow was covering the ground which was not unusual in September at 2500m above sea level and despite a double layer of warm clothes, Vittorio Emanuele was still cold. He was …
The Blue Vet Diary 