It is pitch black even though the Kalahari sun has been up for 4 hours. The temperature is approaching 50C. The metal surrounding me is almost too hot to touch. I'm lying on my back, working by head torch light. The feeling of claustrophobia is overwhelming, I've not felt this enclosed since misguidedly accepting British Coal's corporate hospitality invite to go down a coal mine! After 45 minutes of fumbling, poking and groping (it's not what you think Carol!...

According to the lapa thermometer it is 46C in the shade. The humidity is overwhelming. We are sweating from parts of our bodies that we didn't know we had. It is as though we are wearing miniature Victoria Falls (or a Zuma shower head). The only positive is that the mosquitos are drowning before they can bite us! Fortunately, between the 6 of us there are years of experience of coping with the heat of the midsummer African bush, and we soon come up with a plan....

Difficult to start in the mornings, drinks fuel, noisy, noxious fumes out of the back end, lumpy chassis, bits falling off, very high maintenance costs, fluid leaks all over the place, but that's enough about Angela I'm supposed to be talking about our Landrover! Now you may have been impressed by the ability of scientists to land a probe on a comet 4.5 billion miles from our planet after a 10 year journey, but that is nothing compared to the odds of having a ...

"Here Ralph, come here Ralph you naughty boy, heel, tummy rubs, good boy" Sadly it's not every day of the week that a tall blonde woman dressed in riding gear and flicking a whip in one hand addresses you in the language above so you can forgive me for being slightly slow off the mark in response. My momentary hesitation allowed my namesake, a 4 legged canine cross between a dingo and a Chihuahua to get in ahead of me for the promised attention. Oh well, may...

Pre-ramble My apologies for the delay between blogs recently. I've come up with the following excuses: 1) The dog ate my laptop 2) Hemingway, Shakespeare, Mailer, Tolstoy, Ibsen, Spilsbury and Austen, all the literary giants get writer's block 3) I was abducted by aliens (again?Ed) 4) I've only just recovered from tick bite fever The answer is, of course, all of the above. Anyway, on to the blog……. Murder in Meiringen, Switzerla...