We drank our K-cups and headed down the street to a Wendy’s for breakfast. We should have known better. It was substandard fare. Even the orange juice was shaky. But, with the crummy breakfast out of the way, we headed mostly west on US-191 until we came to UT-313 where we turned South into Canyonlands National Park and Dead Horse Point State Park. The roads here run atop the mesa on the West side of the Colorado River gorge, offering views of spectacular canyons. The strata of the soils from the last million or billion years are plainly evident and multi-colored with almost infinite shades of pastel hues.

Since we have a geezer pass, we got into the national park for free. But it would have been worth the expenditure even if we had to pay $30, like ordinary, although younger, mortals. We coughed up about $10 to go into Dead Horse Point State Park, but it was worth every penny. The scenery in this part of Utah is stunning and we could happily come here about once a week forever, if we could pull it off. My mobility is terrible these days, particularly with our recent encounters with tiny toilets and slippery showers (the Park Service has better restrooms), but the views from the car are superb here. Once in a while, Peg would jump out of the car for a short walk to the nearby edge of an overlook but she would take pictures and come back to show me what she could see. These places are gorgeous.

After spending the day traveling through striking venues, we headed back to the Big Horn Inn. It is a bit of a disappointment returning to the site of the micro-mini-midget toilet and greased shower floor but they have a decent restaurant. We got take-out there for dinner. The Big Horn Inn costs about the same as other, comparable motels in Moab which is on the nasty side of $200 a night. Two days’ stay here in Moab ran about the same as four nights anywhere else we have stayed on this trip. Perhaps our idea of trying to stay in old-style motels envisioned at the outset of this trip was goofy or maybe the motels in Moab are overpriced, but inferior.