Anne Steves is an American registered nurse, social activist, and the former wife of Rick Steves, America’s most recognized authority on European travel and host of the long-running PBS series Rick Steves’ Europe. Born on April 4, 1960, in Snohomish, Washington, she married Rick in 1984 and spent the next 26 years raising two children, supporting a travel empire that grew into a $100 million annual business, and maintaining a quiet personal life that stood in deliberate contrast to her husband’s very public career.
Their divorce was finalized on March 5, 2010, at Snohomish County Superior Court. Anne has never remarried, has no social media presence, and continues to live privately in Washington State, working as a nurse and contributing to her community on her own quiet terms.
Anne Steves — Quick Bio
| Detail | Information |
| Full Name | Anne Steves |
| Date of Birth | April 4, 1960 |
| Age (2026) | 65 years old |
| Birthplace | Snohomish, Washington, USA |
| Birth Sign | Aries |
| Nationality | American |
| Ethnicity | Caucasian |
| Height | 5 ft 5 in (165 cm) |
| Profession | Registered Nurse; Social Activist |
| Nursing Specialty | Nuclear Medicine (reported) |
| Ex-Husband | Rick Steves (m. 1984 – div. March 5, 2010) |
| Children | Andy Steves (son), Jackie Steves (daughter) |
| Marriage Duration | ~26 years |
| Divorce Court | Snohomish County Superior Court, Washington |
| Remarried | No |
| Social Media | None |
| Current Residence | Snohomish/Edmonds area, Washington State |
| Net Worth | Not publicly disclosed |
Early Life in Snohomish, Washington
Anne Steves grew up in Snohomish, Washington, a small city in Snohomish County, about 30 miles northeast of Seattle. It’s a community shaped by Pacific Northwest values: practical, community-minded, and grounded in service rather than spectacle. Those values never left her.
Details about her parents and siblings remain private. What is documented is her professional direction — Anne pursued nursing, a career that requires both scientific competence and genuine human empathy. She went on to specialize in nuclear medicine, a technically demanding branch of healthcare that involves using radioactive materials to diagnose and treat conditions ranging from heart disease to cancer. This is not a field someone drifts into casually. It requires years of study, clinical training, and precision.
Long before her name became attached to Rick Steves’, Anne had built a professional identity entirely her own.
Who Is Rick Steves? Understanding the Man She Married
To understand Anne’s story fully, you need to know who Rick Steves is — because his career defined the environment she navigated for 26 years.
| Detail | Information |
| Full Name | Richard John Steves Jr. |
| Born | May 10, 1955, Barstow, California |
| Raised | Edmonds, Washington (from age 12) |
| Education | University of Washington — Business & European History |
| Known For | Rick Steves’ Europe on PBS; European travel guidebooks |
| Company | Rick Steves’ Europe (founded 1976, Edmonds, WA) |
| Company Revenue | ~$100 million annually (pre-COVID peak) |
| Net Worth | ~$15 million |
| Guidebooks | Had 18 of the top 20 bestselling European guidebooks in the US |
| TV Show | Rick Steves’ Europe — PBS since 2000 |
| Radio Show | Travel with Rick Steves — weekly public radio |
| Tours | 30,000 travelers taken to Europe annually |
| Current Partner | Shelley Bryan Wee (dating since December 2019) |
| Health | Diagnosed with prostate cancer August 2024; surgery successful |
Rick Steves began his career in the mid-1970s teaching travel classes at the University of Washington. He self-published his first guidebook, Europe Through the Back Door, in 1980 — selling copies out of his car. By the time he and Anne married in 1984, he had already begun leading organized three-week European tours. His company and public profile only grew larger from there.
He spends roughly four months every year in Europe — filming, researching, and leading tours. For a marriage, that schedule is a constant structural pressure.
How Anne and Rick Met
Anne and Rick met in the early 1980s in the Edmonds/Seattle area of Washington. They dated for approximately two years before marrying. Their wedding was held at St. Thomas of Villanova in Villanova, Pennsylvania, with a reception at Saint David’s Golf Club. It was a traditional ceremony, reflecting both families’ values — Rick being of Lutheran faith with Norwegian ancestry, and Anne shaped by the community-oriented culture of Snohomish.
They made their home in Edmonds, Washington — the same town where Rick had grown up and where his travel business was headquartered. For Anne, this meant building a family life in a community she knew, surrounded by the Pacific Northwest landscape she had always called home.
26 Years of Marriage: What Anne’s Role Actually Was
The competitor article and most coverage of Anne Steves defaults to phrases like “emotional support” and “behind-the-scenes help”, which are true but undersell what 26 years of partnership with a workaholic, frequently absent public figure actually involves.
Running the Family While Rick Traveled Europe
Rick Steves has been open about his schedule: four months a year in Europe, constant writing, TV production, radio shows, and running a company that eventually employed hundreds of people. That schedule left a significant operational gap at home.
Anne filled it. She raised Andy and Jackie primarily in Edmonds. She maintained the household, managed the family’s daily reality, and created the stable environment from which Rick could launch himself into the world and come back to. Without that foundation, the empire Rick built would have looked very different.
Behind the Growing Business
In the early years of Rick Steves’ Europe, when it was still a small operation run out of Edmonds, Anne was part of the support structure that kept it functioning. She was present during the period when Rick went from selling guidebooks out of his car to building a nationally recognized travel brand. The company’s early growth happened within the context of their marriage.
Raising Two Children Who Became Remarkable Adults
The most visible evidence of Anne’s parenting is in her children.
Andy Steves, their son, followed his father directly into the travel world. He founded Weekend Student Adventures (WSA) Europe, a company offering budget European travel programs specifically for students. He also authored Andy Steves’ Europe: City-Hopping on a Budget, a guidebook aimed at the college traveler demographic his father had never specifically targeted. Andy built his own brand, his own company, and his own audience, not as Rick Steves’ son, but as a travel entrepreneur in his own right.
Jackie Steves, their daughter, pursued writing and travel-related work. She has contributed to family projects and maintains a more private life than her brother. In 2023, Rick shared photos on Facebook of his newborn grandson, Jackie’s child, marking a new chapter in the Steves family story. Anne is now a grandmother.
Two children who grew up to be independent, creative, and professionally serious. That doesn’t happen without intentional parenting.
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The Divorce: Facts, Not Speculation
What Is Actually Documented
The divorce between Anne and Rick Steves was filed by Anne in 2009 and finalized on March 5, 2010, at Snohomish County Superior Court in Washington State. That is the verified public record.
Neither Anne nor Rick has ever publicly stated the specific reasons. No public dispute, no media drama, no competing narratives.
What Rick Has Acknowledged
Rick Steves has, in various interviews over the years, been candid about his workaholic tendencies and the toll his travel schedule took on his personal life. He has acknowledged spending roughly a third of every year abroad. He has described himself as someone who measured his success by trips impacted rather than time at home — a philosophy that works brilliantly for a travel empire and carries real costs for a marriage.
The most widely reported factor is the strain of Rick’s demanding travel schedule and the sustained separation it required. After 26 years and two children, both parties chose to end the marriage quietly and focus on co-parenting rather than conflict.
What Happened After
Anne returned to private life in Snohomish/Edmonds. Rick remained in Edmonds, running his company from the same building whose window overlooks his old junior high school. In December 2019, Rick began dating Shelley Bryan Wee — a bishop of the Northwest Washington Synod in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America. They are still together as of 2026.
In August 2024, Rick publicly announced he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. Two months later, he revealed that surgery had been successful and he was on “the road to recovery.” Anne’s name was not part of that news cycle — she had long since built a life entirely separate from Rick’s public story.
Anne’s Career: A Nurse Who Chose Purpose Over Fame
Anne Steves is a registered nurse with a reported specialty in nuclear medicine. She has worked in healthcare for decades, a career defined not by attention, but by direct human impact.
Nuclear medicine nursing is a specialized field that sits at the intersection of oncology, cardiology, and diagnostic imaging. Nurses in this specialty work with patients undergoing:
- PET scans and SPECT scans for cancer staging and monitoring
- Radioactive iodine therapy for thyroid conditions
- Bone scans for detecting metastatic cancer
- Cardiac stress tests using radioactive tracers
It is technically demanding, emotionally intense, and among the most meaningful work in modern healthcare. Anne has spent decades doing it while raising two children and supporting a husband who was away for months at a time.
Beyond her clinical work, she has been involved in community health initiatives and social causes in the Snohomish/Edmonds area, contributing without seeking recognition, which has been her consistent pattern across every chapter of her life.
Anne Steves in 2026
At 65 years old, Anne Steves lives quietly in Washington State. She has not remarried. She has no public social media accounts. She gives no interviews.
What she has is:
- A nursing career she built on her own credentials and maintained through marriage, divorce, and everything after
- Two grown children, a son who built a travel empire and a daughter who became a mother
- A grandchild, born in 2023
- A community she has served for decades
- A private life chosen with full awareness of what it means to have chosen differently
The Nestivo article about Anne describes her legacy in terms of “quiet strength” and “compassion”, which are real. But they miss the specifics. Anne Steves is not notable primarily because she was married to Rick Steves. She is notable because she was a trained nuclear medicine nurse, a primary parent, a 26-year partner in the build-up of a $100 million travel company, and a woman who handled a very public divorce with complete dignity, all without ever asking anyone to pay attention.
FAQs About Anne Steves
Who is Anne Steves?
Anne Steves is an American registered nurse, social activist, and the former wife of travel writer and PBS host Rick Steves. Born on April 4, 1960, in Snohomish, Washington, she was married to Rick from 1984 until their divorce was finalized on March 5, 2010. She is the mother of Andy Steves and Jackie Steves.
How old is Anne Steves in 2026?
She is 65 years old, having been born on April 4, 1960.
Why did Anne and Rick Steves divorce?
Neither party has publicly disclosed specific reasons. The most widely reported factor is the sustained pressure of Rick’s demanding travel schedulec, spending roughly four months per year in Europe, and his self-described workaholic tendencies. Anne filed for divorce in 2009, and it was finalized at Snohomish County Superior Court on March 5, 2010.
What does Anne Steves do professionally?
She is a registered nurse with a reported specialty in nuclear medicine. She has worked in healthcare for decades and has also been involved in community health programs and social causes in Washington State.
Who are Anne Steves’ children?
Her son Andy Steves founded Weekend Student Adventures (WSA) Europe and authored Andy Steves’ Europe: City-Hopping on a Budget. Her daughter Jackie Steves is a writer and traveler who became a mother in 2023, making Anne a grandmother.
Did Anne Steves remarry?
No. Anne has not remarried after her 2010 divorce from Rick Steves.
Is Rick Steves still with Anne Steves?
No. Rick Steves has been in a relationship with Shelley Bryan Wee — a bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, since December 2019. In August 2024, Rick announced he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer and later confirmed successful surgery.
What is Rick Steves’ net worth?
Rick Steves’ net worth is estimated at approximately $15 million. His company, Rick Steves’ Europe, generates roughly $100 million in annual revenue and takes 30,000 travelers to Europe per year. He had 18 of the top 20 bestselling European guidebooks in the US at his peak.
Where does Anne Steves live now?
She lives privately in the Snohomish/Edmonds area of Washington State, maintaining no public social media presence and giving no interviews.
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