WEDNESDAY 20 OCTOBER A whistle stop in Vancouver

4.30 am start for 7.00 am flight from Toronto to Vancouver. Arrived at 9.20 am Vancouver time. Taxi to the University of British Columbia to visit the Centre for Research on Personhood in Dementia (CRPD) in the Department for Social Work. There I was hosted and made welcome by Alison Phinney and Elizabeth Kelson together with their PhD student Sing Mei (please forgive the spelling if I have this wrong). We spent a fascinating two hours discussing matters of mutual interest relating to storytelling and dementia. Further information on the CRPD at: http://www.crpd.ubc.ca/


The CRPD Team at UBC with Alison Phinney in the foreground in red.

4.00 pm flight from Vancouver to Seattle. Transfer to the Edgewater Hotel on the waterfront which is to be home for the next 4 nights. This was where the Beatles stayed on their visit to the city in the '60s. There I met up with fellow participants from many countries at the start of a 10 day study tour of ageing services facilities and technology developers in the US West Coast states organised by the International Association of Homes and Services for the Ageing (IAHSA), of which I am Vice Chairman, and the US Center for Aging Services Technologies (CAST).



The famous Edgewater Hotel on the Seattle waterfront on the edge of the Puget Sound.