I was born in 1953 in Dordrecht, the oldest town in Holland. Today I live with my partner Jenny and daughter Christa in Zoetermeer, close to Amsterdam and Rotterdam. It is here that I earn a living as a teacher of Dutch language and literature.

I was introduced to fly fishing for trout for the first time in Norway during my long summer holidays in the mid 1960s. A French fly fisherman, Monsieur Lascouche, from Marseille and his son Michel took me along into the mountains where they showed me a simple but productive technique for fishing small streams with a spinning rod, plastic floater and flies.

Catching my first trout with flies was a miracle; something I will never forget.

Monsieur Lascouche himself used a real split cane fly rod that impressed me a lot. I can still recall the image of Lascouche standing in the river casting and casting …

From the mid 1970s, I started travelling south into Belgium, France and Spain where I took up fly fishing again … after a period in which (chasing after) other beings than fish distracted my attention. Especially in the south of France and in Spain, I sometimes met with extremely difficult fishing. High temperature in the daytime, massive fly hatches in the evening and small populations of shy fish made me learn the hard way.

In the late 1980s, I met Hans and Ina van Klinken who re-introduced me to fishing in Scandinavia after some twenty years. The contact with fly fishers in Scandinavia - Hans and Ina in the first place – and the beauty of the natural surroundings influenced me a lot. The passion for fly fishing got hold of me more and more. I started collecting fly fishing books, writing articles, corresponding with friends, designing my own flies and shooting fly fishing and fly tying pictures.

I have been a member of the editorial staff of the Dutch fly fishing magazine De Nederlandse Vliegvisser for some ten years, and I have written for magazines in England, Belgium and Italy. In September 2002, I wrote the book Tying Flies with CDC published by Merlin Unwin Books, England and Stackpole Books, USA.

My favorite waters for trout and grayling fishing are found in Scandinavia, Belgium and Slovenia , and for coarse fish and pike fishing, here at home in Holland.