An Extended Visit!

One of my closest friends from Georgia -- Stephanie -- called me a few months ago and excitedly announced, "I just booked my flight to Alaska!" We have known one another practically our entire lives... so to hear this was very exciting. She initially booked her trip for June 5-10th because of her work schedule, but she ended up getting the chance to take the summer off and just relax until classes started back up -- she's in Nursing school -- so I called her in May and asked if she could extend her trip to two weeks (or more!) since she didn't have any commitments. That way, I wouldn't have to take so many days off from work.

She changed the dates of her trip and landed in Anchorage on Thursday. It's been go, go, go since she hit the ground. Haha. Bob had to work this weekend, tending to a reality television star Ambre Lake (she was the winner of VH1's Rock of Love 2) who Bob invited to come up. KWHL turned it into a contest to go fishing / hang out with her. So after I got off work on Friday, I picked up Steph and we hit the road south to meet up with Bob and everyone camping down in Soldotna. The next day, I decided to drive us down to Homer because we were already halfway there (it's like a 5+ hr drive to Homer from Anchorage!). The weather wasn't that great, but we made the most of it. For the first time, Steph got to eat halibut (YUM!) while we watched a sailboat competition. After lunch, we wandered around the Homer Spit going in some of the cutsie little shops.

I hold Homer very near and dear to my heart... because that is where I spent the majority of my first trip to Alaska. And this was the first time I've been here since that trip.