Retreating to Homer

Our knit group took a walk on the wild side and held our fall retreat at a new venue out of town. Once in a while it's fun to shake things up a little. With the complicity of Dawn, temporarily located in the end-of-the-road community of Homer, Alaska, we booked accommodation at a beachside lodge that's part of the venerable Driftwood Inn.

After a brief game of musical lodges, we settled into the Seaside Lodge, which proved to be the perfect place for us. We filled only two of its rooms, but owing to the late season had the huge common area to ourselves.

Lots of comfy seating, lots of light flooding through huge windows, splendid view of Katchemak Bay outside those windows. An ideal place for hours of knitting!

And even better during the daytime was the sunny deck:

If you're not familiar with the local climate, you may not appreciate how extraordinary was the warmth and sunshine. It could just as easily have been raining sideways, in which case the retreat would have to retreat indoors with our wine and chocolate. (Still not a bad option, see lodge common room above.)

We had visits from local Homer knitting groups, which were such fun we forgot to take pictures. We had al fresco meals:

Visits to the nearby yarn store, KnittyStash,

great meals, and many, many laughs.

The clear weather meant that one evening a giant "hunter moon" was rising over the mountains to the east:

while the sun set behind Mt. Augustine volcano in the west:

By Sunday evening, though, change was in the air. Clouds were moving in, and the wind was up.

And we awoke Monday morning to a different world:

Yup. It SNOWED. Hardy Alaska Woman Judy dashed out to rescue a cushion from the deck:

and we cleaned up, packed up, warmed up the cars, and departed over the mountains toward home, still laughing: