And Miles to Go Before I Sleep

After three years working as a young vet in rural Aberdeenshire, Hugh Cran decided that it was time for a change. He got it. He took a post in Kenya and, forty years later, he's still there, still working, still loving every exasperating, challenging, unexpected moment. This is a page-turning account of working as a vet at the sharp end. Cattle owned by the Maasai herdsmen or the white settlers might take up most of Hugh's time, but these cattle are assailed by lightning strike, snake bites, disease passed on by zebra and wildebeest. He's up against sun cancer, witch doctors - who knows what to expect next? Travelling miles on rough roads, Hugh never knows if he will be performing surgery on dirty sacks, besieged by every species of Kenyan insect, by the light of a failing car-headlamp! But the colourful people who frequent Hugh's Nukuru practice, the sheer vitality of the Kenyan scene and the rewarding nature of the grinding task in hand, keep him answering that persistent phone, day and night, and heading off into the unknown.

Hugh Cran qualified as a veterinary surgeon in Edinburgh in the early 1960s. In search of adventure and more sunshine than Aberdeen could offer, he answered a small ad. in 1966 to work in a rural practice in Kenya. As well as working as a general vet in Nakuru, he kept diaries, and explored the wild mountains of Kenya. After a colourful and exhausting 50-year career in Africa he has just returned to the UK and now lives in Castle Carey, Somerset with his wife Berna.