Thanks to my parents, my childhood was full of outdoor (and underground) adventures.  Whilst my friends were on sunny beaches in Devon, the Fletcher family summer holidays consisted of walks up mountains in the rain with no view from the top, eating sandwiches in the shelter of some stone wall to get out of the gale force winds and Dad saying, “Isn’t this great?”
 
Dad travelled all over the UK and Europe in search of adventure. When I went to graduate school in Alaska, Mum and Dad came to visit a few times and of course managed to see and experience more of Alaska than most people who live there, including me sending them off on a plane to Dutch Harbor in the middle of the Aleutian islands with nothing more than a tent and doing a several day trip up the unpaved Dalton highway to north of the Arctic Circle.
 
I then moved to NZ and Mum and Dad came down there and did lots of travel and hiking, again going to places I’ve never been. They signed up for a couple of New Zealand’s so-called Great Walks, which are multi-day hikes where you have to book huts to stay in and they limit the number of people. Most people doing these hikes are fit young youth hostellers. Dad told me one hike they did was the Kepler Track, 4-day 60 km loop in the Southern Alps. Each day they would get up and walk and arrive at the next hut by lunch time, then wait and watch while all the fit young hikers came trailing in. I’m sure I would have been at the back of the line. It was always a bit embarrassing to have parents fitter than me.
 
A love of adventure and the outdoors were the hallmark of Dad’s life.
 
Growing up, I always thought my Dad could do anything.  He could fix anything in the house (plumbing, electric, he built an extension on our old house). When we went to my Gran’s house, she always had a list of things for him to fix and he was often helping friends and neighbors. He loved working with wood and made tables, chairs, lamp stands, picture frames, bed frames, dolls houses and our Christmas games of skittles and shove ha’penny. Dad darned his own socks, mended tents and backpacks, fixed my bike and polished my shoes, always knew where we were when we were hiking in the mist and always had a warm hand to hold, even in the freezing cold. I kind of took it all for granted. That’s just what dads do. As I grew up and travelled and met more people, I realized just how special Dad is. Most people can not do all those things. My boyfriends had a lot to live up to. I took Mum and Dad cross-country skiing in Alaska when they visited one time in the winter. Mum did what most beginners did (including me when I first started) – fell over a lot. Dad, though, skied perfectly well and I don’t think he fell over at all. Poor Mum fell over so much that she was really pretty sore, but of course didn’t give up and the next few times we went out she put a cushion down her backside!
 
Speaking of Mum, you all know how amazing she was. She left a huge hole in all our lives, especially Dad’s. I am so very proud of Dad, because instead of dwelling on missing her, he realized that would not be what Mum would have wanted. Instead he somehow took on doing all the things Mum used to do. He remembered birthdays of all the family and made individual birthday cards for each person each year, he painted and made an original Christmas card every year, made his own flapjack and fruit cake for walking trips, made homemade marmalade, did all the cooking and cleaning and ironing and all the talking to neighbors that Mum used to do (and even enjoyed it!). He learned how to use a sewing machine to make and mend clothes. After Libby and Katie and my oldest daughter Sophie were born, Mum made them each a lovely quilt. After Charlie (the youngest grandchild) was born, Dad took it upon himself to make him the most amazing homemade quilt filled with wonderful geometric shapes. It is such a perfect combination of Dad’s technical and artistic sides, and touched me so much.
 
Dad struggled a lot with his health in the past few years, but every time I talked to him he was always so positive and had some interesting story to tell – and always wanted to know how we were all doing, brushing off any questions about his health. He took pleasure on so many things and really did lead an amazing life.