Kathie Lee and Hoda at Browseabout July 23

For one woman, this visit is a story of triumph and reconciliation; for the other, the story is a bittersweet return to a much-loved childhood playground.

These stories are those of Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford, the unshakable hosts of the relaxed final hour of NBC’s Today Show, the hosts whose personal stories from Rehoboth Beach are set to play out before a huge television audience as they make appearances and tape segments at some of their favorite beach locales.

Though both hosts have family ties to Rehoboth Beach and bountiful personal experiences in the Cape Region, the visit this weekend will be decidedly more business-like as both hosts sign books from 10 a.m. to noon, Saturday, July 23, at Browseabout Books on Rehoboth Avenue.

Gifford said she will be appearing in support of her latest children’s book, “The Legend of Messy M’Cheaney,” a rhyming picture book she based in part on her daughter Cassidy’s disorderly ways as a child.

Gifford said Cassidy insisted, "'You have to make the main character a boy or everyone will know it’s me." Kathie Lee added,  ”Of course, now she couldn’t care less.”

The hosts' visit to Rehoboth Beach, Gifford said, will be chronicled in a series of Today Show tapings for a segment she called, “My Rehoboth, My Rehoboth,” which is based on Kotb's and Gifford’s experiences at the resort.

In 1963, Gifford’s family bought a hotel on the corner of First Street and Brooklyn Avenue, where she worked when she wasn’t busy at her first job, serving soft-serve custard at Kohr Brother’s stands.

In the years since, she said she made regular trips to the seaside community, as her sister still does, until her father passed away in 2003. Since then, Gifford said she has spent summers in Nantucket so her return to Rehoboth will be tough.

“Literally,” she said, “this is going to be huge emotionally.”

And with not one, but two Today Show hosts signing books Saturday: Kathie Lee’s children’s book and Kotb’s memoir, just released in paperback, “How I Survived War Zones, Bad Hair and Kathie Lee.”

The memoir’s title, she said, is a tongue-in-cheek barb at her co-host, who, Kotb said, she has grown to admire. When referring to Gifford in a professional manner, Kotb has made her opinion clear in countless published reports.

“She’s not a diva, always on time, and she comes to play,” she said.

Browseabout Books owner Steve Crane said this weekend should be action-packed during the celebrity arrivals and signing.

“We’re expecting at least 1,000,” Crane said. “The phone has been ringing off the hook.”

Other area retailers, he said, have gotten involved to provide gift bags for certain groups that have traveled long distances to participate. The Ice Cream Store on Rehoboth Avenue even created a wine-flavored ice cream  to honor the arrival of the co-hosts who call Tuesday “Boozeday.”

Crane said he is eagerly anticipating the signing as he ties up loose ends in preparation for the event.

“We’re trying to get all our friends involved,” he said. “This will be the biggest event we have ever had.”