A little bit about us.
Ryan and I met in New Hampshire Nov 2018. I am a New Jersey native myself who has lived in Tennessee and Alaska. Ryan hails from Wisconsin but has spent many years living on the Mexican border in Texas. Who knows what brought each of us to New England. Our first date was at one of our favorite restaurants in Hooksett, NH, a brewpub with 48 beers on tap and great meals. New England Tap House. Ryan got the Seadog Wild Blueberry beer, and looked at my IPA order wide-eyed. Our first date was a success, and he even cleaned the fresh snow off my car that accumulated during the 3 hours we spent getting to know each other. Little did we know we would frequent that favorite place many times over the next couple of years, while also finding more hole in wall restaurants and dive bars - a true favorite of ours.
I work in the medical field, and did my training in rural Tennessee. My clinical rotations lead me up to Alaska where I worked rurally in the Aleutian Islands in the small family medicine clinic. Then moved to Seward Alaska to live "on the road system", as to not have to rely on flights on small places in bad weather to get into Anchorage when needed. Seward might be my favorite place in the U.S. It's a quaint harbor town nestled on the Kenai Peninsula. I would take runs along the harbor, and see the whales bubble feeding at the surface of the water in the summer. I made friends with Coastie families, and we bonded over life as transplants living in such a gorgeous corner of Alaska.
Life would then lead me to New Hampshire, which was nice to be only a 5 hour drive from my family. New England is full of short weekend adventures to Portland, Boston, Portsmouth, Provincetown, Acadia National Park, and other small towns in between. Portsmouth is our personal favorite, with cobblestone streets full of shops and restaurants along the water. Ryan and I ended up buying an 1890's farmhouse in Pembroke NH for a steal of a price, which was an adventure in and of itself. Renovations kept Ryan busy while he was laid off when the hospitality field crashed in spring 2020. Their loss was OUR gain, because Ryan really made that house a [lucrative] beauty. With the Pandemic job transition, we then ended up in Spokane Washington, when the hospitality industry was making it's come back. And here we have been since fall/winter 2021. But man was it sad to see that farmhouse go...
My travel adventures have included mission work in Haiti, Sri Lanka, and Rwanda. I visited Australia for a month with friends during clinical rotations in graduate school, which was a dream. Ryan and I snuck over the Europe JUST before the Pandemic hit in Feb 2020, visiting Spain, Portugal, and an extra cool "hop" over to Morocco via ferry. I just recently spent some time in London and Paris with one of my best friends Michelle (who was with me in Australia too) and it was great to add those to the list of cities we've seen together since graduate school. For Ryan and I, Mexico and Canada are crossed off our list, Mexico being a long time favorite of Ryan's. Quebec City in Canada surprising became one of our favorites, a gem of a city to visit if you live in New England. A quick hop across the border, and they were already speaking French. New Years is magical there, but our other favorite was to relax at Strom Nordic Spa, for an outdoor Nordic thermal spa experience of soothing hot tubs and saunas.
From our cozy lake house in Washington, we are now planning our small wedding in Rome Italy this summer! A intimate gathering of a few close family members, but a lifetime of memories.
Next up, we are headed to Vietnam, South Korea, and Dominican Republic next month. It's Ryan's first trip to Asia, another continent checked off for him, so swing back here to hear some wild stories.
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