It all seemed so easy six months ago when I opened that spreadsheet and entered a column of dates on its left side. Those dates were calculated at approximately two weeks apart, other than where I knew we’d be away for longer stretches such as the Mexico vacation and around holidays where we might be able to be gone for 4 to 6 days. Today, we are venturing into one of those 6-day affairs because it is Memorial Day Weekend and the beginning of summer. We know better than to travel on Friday or Monday, so we leave on Thursday afternoon and return Tuesday night.

While I’m excited as always to be going out on the road, I’d be remiss to not admit some laziness nipping at the heels saying, “Take a break and just chill out at home.” We are now in the 100s (38c+) here in Phoenix, Arizona, and the heat suggests that lethargy isn’t a bad thing; my brain says something different.

So, where’s this big adventure taking us here at the end of May? The core of this journey will have us between Monument Valley, Mexican Hat, Valley of the Gods, Bears Ears National Monument, Canyonlands with a return to Horseshoe Canyon, and finally, Flagstaff for some long-neglected sights.

But for now, my time in the coffee shop is coming to an end, and all those prep things I need to finish before hitting the road are yet to be done, as I simply let everything go until the last second. Those things are the tedious chores that, once done over a hundred other times, become a quick jam so Caroline and I can get down the road with most everything we need without worrying too much about anything left neglected at home.

Finished all the things requiring finishing. There was so much running around that I was able to go from a measly 3,500 steps as I dropped Caroline at her office this morning to my requisite minimum of 10,000 steps when I returned to get her. It was 4:00 pm when I arrived and surprise of surprises, she was ready.

Up the Beeline Highway for the 2nd time this month but instead of going east to New Mexico as we did two weeks ago, we’ll head north up to Holbrook before continuing on to Utah tomorrow. Considering the size of tonight’s small town and that it’s Thursday, we checked out our dinner options and fixed on stopping in Payson as it looks like Holbrook rolls up the sidewalks at 8:00 pm. Well, before arriving in Payson, we stopped along the highway at the Mogollon Rim Visitor Center to grab this photo of the desert with Four Peaks in the background.

Dinner was effectively American diner fare, nothing great, nothing horrible. On these trips into big nature and small towns, it’s a rare day we stumble into a culinary delight as my daughter and I did last year at Piccola Cucina Ox Pasture in Red Lodge, Montana, or as Caroline and I did just two weeks ago at Ancient Ways in Ramah, New Mexico. There have been other little treasures found along the road, but they are few and far between. This doesn’t imply any kind of disappointment, as fine dining and gourmet meals are not what we are searching for when visiting places with grand vistas that act as the greatest food for the eyes. Zoom in to this photo, and to the right, you’ll see some jagged peaks in the far distance; you are looking at the Four Peaks from about 80 miles away (128km).

It’s about 8:00 pm when we turn left off of Highway 277 and join Highway 377 which will bring us right into Holbrook in about half an hour. Like so many drives out of Phoenix intended to position us somewhere further up the road, it not only shortens our drive the following day, we hope to miss the majority of traffic that is escaping our sprawling city. With only 3.5 hours left in drive time, if we were to head directly to our destination of Mexican Hat, Utah, we’d have plenty of time to wander over the Hopi and Navajo Lands.

Extra tidbits: Caroline was knitting the second sock of a new pair she’s making me, and just before sunset, I asked her to read some Proust to us in our ongoing efforts to tackle In Search of Lost Time. We are currently about 480,000 into the 1.2 million words that comprise this French novel.

It’s dark, and most of the lights are off here at the Wigwam Motel after we checked in, so this was the best photo I was able to capture, though I shot about 20 others. We’re now set up in our tiny room, with a tiny toilet, tiny desk, and too fat of pillows but that’s all great as we are once again sleeping in a wigwam on old Route 66.

They are not fancy, but they are a cultural luxury, and as one of only three of the original Wigwam Villages still in existence, it’s an experience that is absolutely worth repeating. Come to think of it, maybe it’s time for us to stay in Village #7 over in Rialto/San Bernardino, California, during our upcoming July visit. This location in Arizona was known as Village #6, and the other remaining property is in Cave City, Kentucky.