We arrived in Broome around 7am and found ourselves a
suitable place to anchor amongst all the other cruising yachts at Gantheaume
Point.
Right away we got the boat ship shape, I turned on the water
maker and then we went straight to the doctors as I had contracted a serious flesh-eating
infection or blood poisoning.
A couple of days before we got to Dampier, I started to get
bad infections. Any small scratch or skinned knuckle would immediately become
infected. During the bad gale, I suffered a cut to my right thumb and over
night it had turned black and was getting worse by the day.
I had a similar infection on the left hand and they were extremely
painful and by now I was having difficulty sailing and sleeping and needed
antibiotics fast as I was in a bad way.
Luckily the Balinese community helped to get me an immediate
appointment at the doctors and a car and driver waiting at the beach. At the
doctors, swab tests were taken and I was given antibiotics and my wounds were
cleaned out. The doctor was shocked by the severity of my right thumb and I
think I had made it just in time or I could have easily lost my thumb or even
worse.
After the doctor, our new Balinese friend lent us his car
and we went to the laundry matt and did some shopping and bought some fuel. I
needed to buy a new tube and tyre for my dingy wheel as one of them got damaged
dragging the dingy up the beach with a flat tyre. I tired a few places but no
one had the size we needed.
It was a big day and by late afternoon we were ready to go
back to the boat but Dewa who owns the car was too busy at work to take us
back, so we just had to wait. By the time he could drop us back it was dark and
the tide had gone out about a kilometre, so we had to drag the dingy all the way
back to the water behind his car in the dark.
It was a major exercise but eventually we got the dingy back
in the water and floating and we were very grateful for all the help Dewa had
given us today considering we had only just met him. If you are ever in Broome,
go and have a meal in Dewa’s restaurant “DMK – The Kitchen” as you won’t be disappointed.
I slept well knowing the antibiotics were doing their job
and I was on the way to recovery.
Track
Sirocco’s progress
Wow, that's a serious infection Craig!
ReplyDeleteI hope that will heal soon.
I was really in a bad way, but once I got some antibiotics I recovered pretty quickly
ReplyDelete