So there I was springing back down the steep bit like a young mountain goat when I slipped back, put out my hand to save myself and it hurt. A young whippersnapper jumped forward to help up the old dude (bah!), grabbed the offending hand and that hurt too.

By the time I got to the bottom the wrist was swollen and painful and I thought I’d broken something.  When I don’t have the benefit of Xrays in the bush, my rule of thumb in these situations is to treat the offending limb as if broken, and, if it’s still painful after 48 hrs then there’s a fair chance it is.

Since we were heading south away from civilisation and we didn’t want to hang around hospitals, Sally made a splint in the traditional fashion using a pair of underpants and a cardboard box, which worked well for a couple of days till we found some decent quality tourist brochures to replace the cardboard and a clean hanky instead of underpants.

Now fast-forward to Gisborne, where I’m doing these posts at the next available wifi, and after 5 days it still hurts.  Which injury has meant Sally has had to do all the driving and the washing up.

I’ve just had the required xray, and sure enough there was a small avulsion fracture of the triquetral.  Happily the triquetral, one of the 9 wrist bones and the second commonest to be broken by my classic outstretched-hand fall, heals pretty well with a simple immobilisation.  I’ve swapped the tourist brochure splint for an official one (which actually doesn’t work any better, but looks good), and will no doubt get better in about 4 weeks.