"Delaplane is where my heart is," says Ursula Landsrath. Her husband, Ken Rietz concurs, "We have more friends here than anyplace we've ever lived."

The journeys of Ursula and Ken, if plotted on a map, would look like the scratchings of some very busy birds. The lives of these two have been rich in excitement but also visited by adversity and sorrow. Now they are home, with all the comfort that thought brings.

Their beautiful new home sits on a hilltop with expansive views of Virginia's lush green rolling hills. The interior of the home has large comfortable rooms and a main floor without steps. There is a conservatory that runs across the back of the house overlooking a "garden in progress".

"We were reluctant transplants from the West Coast when Ken was transferred to Washington," Ursula says and Ken laughs, "She told me she would follow me anyplace but Washington."

"And then one weekend we were invited by friends to attend a horse race in Middleburg," they say, finishing each other's sentences. "We knew it when we saw it. We fell in love with the area immediately."

"In the few years prior we had spent a year in London, another in New York and then opted to come back to Washington. When we came out here that weekend, we just fell in love with the feel of the countryside and the friendliness of the people," Ken says.

"We returned to explore the area and at some point we were on this remote country road in Delaplane, sitting in the middle of the road while Ursula studied our map, when she looked in the rear view mirror to see a car behind us. It was just sitting there, patiently waiting, not blowing its horn or anything, just waiting. Now where else in the world would that happen?"

Delaplane became home ten years ago; six years later, the Rietz' heard that the Westminster Church and Cemetery property near the town's center was for sale and targeted for demolition. So they bought the property, historically restored the Church, and are working on restoring the cemetery where some of Mosby's Rangers and members of the prominent Ashby and Delaplane families are buried.

"We wanted to save it. It was too important not to save."

They have carved out an office for Ken in the basement. Upstairs in the sanctuary, art classes are being taught by well-known, local still life painter, Ria DeWit. "It is a very special class, with very special people," Ursula enthuses. "We still have one opening."

So what were the dips and detours on life's road that brought these two energetic people here?

Ken started out in Wisconsin and came to Washington the first time to attend George Washington University. He left half way through his senior year to work on a campaign in Wisconsin. He stayed on to help a high school friend, Bill Steiger, be elected one of the youngest members of Congress.

Returning to Washington with Steiger, Ken helped form one of the first political campaign-consulting firms in the country. His reputation as a campaign guru grew as he: helped elect his first client, Bill Brock, as Tennessee's Senator - defeating Al Gore, Sr., a 24 year incumbent; headed up President Nixon's Youth Campaign and then his Inaugural; became the Deputy Chairman of the Republican Party; made history when he helped Mike Curb, a Republican, to be elected Lt. Governor on the first split ballot in 100 years when Gerry Brown, a Democrat, was elected Governor; and, as the chief strategist for Chic Hecht's Senate campaign in Nevada he devised miraculous, come-from-behind wins in both the primary and the general elections of that campaign.

It was during the Hecht campaign that Ken and Ursula met. She knew nothing about politics; she was just trying to help Hecht, her neighbor.

In between political campaigns, Ken managed other business ventures: with Curb he headed up MGM Records and then together they created the very successful record company, Mike Curb Productions.

After the Hecht campaign, Ken became a popular marketing and public relations strategist for the casinos of Las Vegas.

In 1989 one of the world's largest public relations firms, Burson-Marstellar (BM), came knocking on his door and asked him to head up offices for them in California. Over the course of the next sixteen years, Ken rose through BM's hierarchy, moving, with Ursula, to Washington, then on to London, to New York, and ultimately, when he was made Chief Operating Officer, they came back to Washington.

And what of Ursula? She laughs at the thought of talking about herself, "By comparison to Ken's story, mine is short and sweet." She expresses herself in fast-forward, "I was born in Germany, moved at age nine to Australia. Grew up there, studied art and architecture, was a stunt driver, took up skydiving, married my American instructor, and moved from Sydney to Las Vegas."

Ken presses her to share more colorful details, and Ursula agrees, "Okay. I have two passions in life besides my husband - my animals and my art. I am not a social person. I like being at home, working in the garden, being outside. I lost my son Jensen in a car crash when he was in his second year at the US Naval Academy. You can't understand what this does to you unless it happens to you. Then you belong to this horrible club you don't want to belong to. I am happiest on my lawn mower. I love moving rocks around too - no stone ever argued with me."

Ken and Ursula have been together for a long time, 21 years to be exact, married for 14. "I am Ken's fourth wife, he is my third husband. I think this is it." They laugh at each other.

Now retired, they bring their wonderful strength and unique experiences to bear on any issue or project that strikes them as important.

Ken helped the Crooked Run Valley Association (CRVA) successfully lobby to ban semi-trailer trucks from the portion of Route 17 that runs from Delaplane to Paris. The group also convinced Congressman Frank Wolf to find funding to reduce the speed along that route by using blinking lights and special landscaping. "It's great, all of us are volunteers," Ursula says.

The Rietz' feel strongly about preserving the land and also the lifestyle of the area dependent on land. They have built two houses in Delaplane, both designed by Ursula, and put all of their 160 acres into a permanent easement with the Virginia Outdoor Foundation.

Firm believers in the Virginia Agricultural Best Management Practices program the Rietz' have fenced off their creeks and ponds running into the Crooked Run. "We installed water troughs for the cows in order to prevent livestock waste from polluting Crooked Run whose waters, via Goose Creek, end up in the Chesapeake Bay."

Ursula and Ken have three adopted dogs: Bak, a nine-year old Sable Point German Shepherd; Sam, a seven-year old Anatolian Shepherd; and the newest member of the family, Maxine, an eight-month old Great Pyrenees/Anatolian mix. "Rescuing dogs is one of Ursula's great passions," Ken says. "The dogs love her. When she leaves the house, the energy of the house leaves with her."

Another of Ken's great passions is fighting blindness. He was diagnosed with Retinosis Pigmentosa (RP) at 35. "If you can't see something, you don't know it. I just figured that everyone saw the same way I did."

RP affects approximately 500,000 people in the US; it is caused by the inheritance of a mutated gene, and the disease reduces peripheral and night vision, eventually robbing the afflicted of all sight. While Ken can still see some light and some shapes, he is very visually impaired.

He works tirelessly with the Foundation Fighting Blindness (FFB), an organization that has raised $250 million for research on eye diseases. Six years ago Ken helped FFB start an annual dinner in Washington named "For The Love of Sight" to increase awareness about eye disease research. So far, the dinners have raised $2.5 million and Ken was the 2008 recipient of FFB's "Hope and Spirit Award."

He is currently participating in a medical trial at the Emory Eye Center in Atlanta, Georgia, where a capsule the size of a grain of rice was surgically inserted into his eye to release a critical protein. His condition has been helped by the technology he says, but the real potential is for the young people coming along who might be cured.

"I am fortunate that I have kept as much of my sight for as long as I have. That, and living in this age of technology where I can do almost everything. The hardest part is losing your freedom of movement," he says then quickly adds, "I don't think my career suffered however. Strategy happens in the mind, and perhaps not having the distractions of peripheral vision I was better able to keep my focus."

So the Rietz' have come home to Delaplane. Here they have found both focus and purpose. Here, Ursula gives Ken glowing second-to-second updates on the marvels of their view from the top of "A Glimpse of Heaven Lane", and here they are making a real difference, in preserving and keeping the historical integrity of the land, in being an integral part of a community, and in being superb examples of courage in the face of adversity.