Girls Weekend Journal

Tuesday (or should I say Mooseday!?), October 14, 2025 Good morning!!   We slept in a little bit today, getting up around 7ish rather than 6ish and followed our regular morning routine of coffee, chatting, journaling, and, for me, at least, playing word games. I play several on-line word games pretty much every day to try and keep my brain healthy and working.   Waffle, Wordle, Connections, Strands and Quartiles.   Then I also play the mini crossword through the Apple News app (that’s where Quartiles is, too), along with Sudoku and their Emoji game (which is really hard!). THEN, later I play Jeopardy, Question of the Day and Puzzle of the Day through Alexa.   I got Kathi to join me today.   I even got her to play Song Quiz with me even though she tells me that she really hates this one!! The weather today is beautiful.   When looking at the weather app prior to our flights, it looked like it was going to rain every day of our trip.   Turns out however,...

Monday, October 13, 2025   We really hate how fast this trip flies by. It’s already Monday and it feels like we just got here! Today we extended our normal morning routine a bit. It’s so awesome to just relax and take the day slowly. Lori and her husband took a Viking river cruise last year right before GW, and Lori started a mini journal scrapbook/journal of the trip with photos. She brought the journal to North Dakota with us last year, and I loved it and wanted to do one too. Lori gave me a journal and a little printer for Christmas and my birthday, and I have been pretty good at chronicling my travels for both work and play. This morning, I started working on that journal as well as this one. Once again, the rain hasn’t come, and in fact, the sun came out this morning for quite a while. Delightful.   Last night we heard hooting from a Great Horned Owl, which was super cool. He hooted off and on again throughout the night, but we didn’t see him. To be clear, without Lori, I...

Sunday, October 12 The forecast for today was rain in the morning, then a window of time in the afternoon with no rain, so we decided to take the morning to laze around and do what we both enjoy doing, which is journaling, playing word games and just chatting.   Oh, and also eating breakfast!! I had   made a breakfast casserole yesterday morning that Tom and I often enjoy at home.   Sausage, eggs, shredded potatoes, red bell pepper and cheese.   It is quite delicious, so I enjoyed some of that for breakfast while Kathi enjoyed some yogurt. After I had played my word games and while Kathi was still working on the Saturday journal, I started looking for hiking trails that looked promising.   I found the Wynn Nature Center which is a part of the Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies.   They have a visitor center in an old homesteader cabin and several trails and it’s not far away!   Looked perfect!   The website stated “Join us on Sundays at 1:00 pm for...

Saturday, October 11, 2025 Lori and I each got a great night’s sleep of almost 9 hours, and we both felt settled into the new time zone. Lori made a delicious casserole for breakfast, which we’ll be able to enjoy for the rest of the trip. We spent a couple of hours chatting and journaling, then at 9:00 we left to drive to the Spit and find our water taxi. The Blue Too was a landing craft water taxi with a wide front ramp that allows them to pull directly onto a beach for easy and safe loading and unloading of both people and gear. Lori and I dressed warmly, but when the breeze became a bit too chilly out on the deck, we could go into the cabin area and hang out a bit with our Ferryman, Deb. The cabin was slightly heated and had a zip closure to keep the warmth in. Deb didn’t seem too talkative at first, but no one ignores Lori and me when we start showing an interest in what they are doing and how they are doing it, and she soon warmed up. Deb had worked for Mako’s for six years, and w...

  A viewpoint between Anchorage & Homer Friday, October 10, 2025 After a decent night's sleep, I was up and about at around 5:30 am and Kathi was not too far behind me. Our Air BNB home away from home is lovely and we have a SPECTACULAR view of the Homer Spit (a "spit" is a geological formation consisting of a narrow, elongated stretch of sand or gravel that extends from the coast into a body of water) from our balcony, none of which we could see upon our arrival last night because it was pitch dark.  Some perks of this place: a heated bathroom floor, a heated toilet seat and a heated towel rack, along with the view.  It actually was still dark when we got up.  Sunrise was around 8:30 am and as the sun came up it slowly unveiled the view for us. Sunrise from our Air BNB deck     According to the weather app, today is the only day         that is supposed to be rain free. So I decided that we         woul...

Thursday, October 9, 2025   For the first time in a VERY long time, my travel day was more intense than Lori’s. There are so many more states in the eastern half of the country than in the western half. Since Lori lives on the west coast and I live in the Midwest, she usually has to leave home earlier and travel farther than I do. So, it’s only fair that once in a while the travel burden is heavier on me.   My alarm went off at 4:15 am EST and 30 minutes later sent the following text to Lori (for whom it was only 1:45 am): “The adventure begins! I'm in an Uber on the way to the airport.”  Lori would not need to be at the airport for another eight hours. This year marks the 28 th  consecutive Girls Weekend, and I was so excited that it was underway!   I have been obsessing for weeks about packing for this trip. I was determined to do a full week in Alaska and take only a tote and a carry-on. I planned my wardrobe very carefully, focusing on layers. We knew the te...