Summertime in Taranaki: Those glorious days of no school, lounging around, and hanging out by the beach. It has been light till 9 PM in Taranaki. We are outside all day and into the evening with the lovely sunsets from the Oakura beach. Gabe and Emily have discovered a nice doctor/nurse couple (live next door) with a trampoline. It has meant hours of jumps and flips on the tramp--almost as good as back in Iowa. Guess what Al has been doing?
Al has been at work for nine days after returning from Fiji. He has been getting into the groove of the Kiwi medicine-- lots of meetings, computerized hospital records, and tea time twice a day. The staff at Base Hospital and Hawera Community Clinic (one hour south of New Plymouth) typically like the American doctors (including Tom a doctor from Virgina doing a one year assignment).
His case load was smaller than in the States but it has picked up with coverage for doctors away on vacation. Call has been a bit anxiety provoking as to what cases may necessitate a trip into the unit. However, he has had no worries with call after it is over as there has been no extra work (only one telephone call). In fact, he has been on call for only three week day nights since we arrived in New Plymouth in Oct. 2009.
He finishes up tomorrow (Friday) and we will leave for a medical conference on bioethics in Dunedin. The three of us, including Gabe will spend extra time (9 days) to explore the South Island. Everyone says you need to do the South Island to really know New Zealand so we go south. There will be more sunsets and more days of summer in Dunedin, Queenstown, and Milford Sound of the South Island.
That's beautiful, have fun in New Zealand
ReplyDeleteWe have enjoyed looking at the snaps. Enjoy every minute. Our first few weeks back to the US were challenging, but now that the temps are getting better and we can get back to the lake, we are getting better. Please keep posting!
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