Live free or die!

Hey All

"Live free or die" is the state motto of New Hampshire. Believe it or not, seatbelts and motorbike helmets are optional i.e. not legally enforced. New Hampshire is also the only New England state that is Republication, coincidence....? Fireworks can be bought readily much the pyromaniacial joy of Hannah's uncle Peter.

Manchester, New Hampshire is the town that I flew to from Vancouver. Hannah arrived to pick me up and drove me the 40miles to her mom's and Peter (her partner) summer holiday house. It was great to see Hannah after 3 weeks apart. They recently built their house on a beautiful piece land with a view of a forest and a stream with a beaver pond at the bottom of there property.

A big family reunion was held the next day with Hannah's siblings, parents, aunts, uncle, significant others and family friends - most of whom I'd met in 2005. So it was great to see everyone again, especially meeting young Willow who is Hannah's 10month old niece. The conversation with the Weiss family is always entertaining but still has substance and it is definitely not frivolous
.
There was much food to eat and it was great to just relax and take life at a leisurely pace. i think that is probably the point of a summer house! Jenifer and Peter were fantastic and really made us feel so comfortable.

If you picked up the incorrect use of "their" in the last sentence of second paragraph, this site will explain a lot.
















The summer house!















The extended Weiss family!

Back row, left to right - Me, Rima, Karen (Hannah's aunt), Kara (Peter Curtis's daughter), Beth, Julia (Hannah's cousin), Robin (Hannah's aunt), Rachel (Hannah's sister
Bottom row, left to right - Peggy, Jenifer (Hannah's mom!), Peter Weiss (Hannah's uncle), Ruth and Hannah
MIA - Peter Curtis(Jenifer's partner)
















Young Willow!















The beaver pond




















Hannah's aunts Robin and Beth's awesome car!

Vancouver Island

Hey loved ones

I've just spent a fantastic five days on Vancouver Island with Damien and Delayne White who are cousins to my brother in law Ross. Unfortunately my digital camera is on the blink so no pictures unfortunately - think of this as a book and use your imagination! I caught the ferry (all six stories of it!) over to Nanimo on Vancouver Island. I hired a compact and got upgraded to a silver golf 5 with mags, tiptronic transmission / gearbox, sunroof...talk about pimp my rental! I drove the 100km to Port Alberni where Damian and Delayne live. The drive was slow, not just due to acclimatising to driving on the right side of the road, but because the island is so indescribably beautiful. Crystal clear alpine lakes seemingly around every corner that simply take your breath away - not that easy to keep your eyes on the road let alone drive on the right side of the road while imagining the huge trout that must live in the depths of these lakes (some up to 200m deep!).

The Whites stay on Sproat lake. Their hospitality was simply legendary and they really made me feel like one of the family. The Island is an outdoor paradise and simply fishing heaven. I fished for pink salmon in the surf on two evenings and caught a small one. I hired a guide for a day and fished for steelhead (sea run rainbow trout) on the stamp river. The river flows strong and wide and seemingly as all water on the island, is crystal clear. The steelhead and salmon don't feed when they are in the river and they are caught only through striking in instinct and aggression. We saw steelhead been 10-12lbs holding at the bottom of the river (a sight to make any fly fisherman weak at the knees). The technique is to get a heavily weighted fly down to them and strip it right in front of them hoping to a strike. And hope we did. But even though I had several follows, I wasn't lucky enough to get a take. We did eventually catch a steelhead of about 10lbs on spinning tackle - what a beauty! I fished with Damian the next day from the bank and lost two probably through shock at actually hooking two!

The rest of our days were spent reading, trying to stay on tubes while being pulled behind the boat at breakneck speed and lying on tubes while floating down the river - pure magic!

It was with sadness and excitement that I left for the next leg of the strengthening ties tour - New Hampshire and the Weiss family reunion!

Many thanks to the Whites for hosting me with such incredible hospitality!















This is the Stamp river where we caught the steelhead. Believe it or not, the river is about 2-3m deep here!














My first and rather small salmon.














Floating down the Stamp river with the girls.














Looking upriver from one of the fishing spots on the Stamp.














10lbs Steelhead.















The view from the White's balcony - breathtaking!














The view from my bedroom - tough waking up to this every morning!

Ultimate Worlds Champions

Hey loved ones



Well, it's been 15 days since we left the shores of Africa and it almost feels like a life time already. We flew to New York and were met by Karen and Reema (Karen is Hannah's aunt). It is the best feeling ever being met at an airport!



Hannah stayed in New York for a few days before going to the World AIDS conference held in Mexico city. We've had a couple of days to check out Vancouver before the tournament starts.

Here are some pictures from the tournament.

Check out the official blog at ultimatesamen.blogspot.com.























Yes, that is a World Ultimate Championship Gold Medal!!!
















Bridget's Gilbride's Gold Medal - Thank you for sharing!
















This is Kira (Canadian Mixed) who I reckon is the best ultimate player I have ever seen. She probably has a restraining order against me though after losing my dignity when meeting her for the first time. Thank goodness I introduced myself as Steve Crawford.