Day 7 • Torrey

Day 7: Friday, July 31—

We quickly cleared out of our little-but-very-expensive dive motel and headed into Kayenta for breakfast at a diner. The food was good but the service, consisting of one waitress who wasn’t going to break her neck, or a fingernail, for anyone, couldn’t have been much slower. Then we drove toward Monument Valley via U.S. Route 163, making repeated stops along the way to soak in the splendor of the land with its virgin vistas and enchanting buttes.

Once inside Monument Valley, we parked and made our way to the visitor’s center, being accosted along the way by Navaho guides offering tours of the valley. The terrace outside the visitor’s center was not the place to hang out—the view was great, but the bugs were awful. And we found little of interest inside the center, so we got back in the car and began our self-guided tour through Monument Valley on the 17-mile loop, aka Valley Drive, which is a red dirt road that circles around the valley. The highlights were as follows:

• The drive started out precariously with a steep descent via a series of switchbacks down a craggy dirt road, but it soon leveled off and was markedly improved the rest of the way.

• We then passed by the oft photographed and filmed buttes known as East & West Mittens. It felt like we were in a John Ford western, and in a way we were.

• Early on, the buttes were spectacular, and toward the end of the loop at a vantage called Artist’s Point, they were sublime.

• We stopped at Artist’s Point for pictures and to inspect the Navaho-made trinkets that an elderly Navaho woman was selling. Travis bought Sharon a white stone necklace. What a nice gesture.

• Incidentally, Monument Valley is not a national park but land belonging to the Navaho nation, some of whom live there.

From Monument Valley, we returned to US 163 and continued north through rugged and empty country toward a town called Mexican Hat, Utah. We almost stopped along the way at a roadside stall to buy a steer’s skull. I kind of wished we had because it would have made such a cool decoration, although transporting it home would have been difficult.

As far as I could tell, Mexican Hat was on the map only because there wasn’t anything else in the area to put on it. The town wasn’t much more than a hole in the wall, yet it was a hole in the wall with a restaurant, the San Juan Inn & Trading Post along the San Juan River. The restaurant was dark and empty, the food tasty, the beer delightful, and the view from the balcony overlooking the river inspiring (and a bit scary). After lunch, we browsed in the nearby souvenir shop, filled up the gas tank, and a little way outside of town passed the rock formation that gave Mexican Hat its name. It wasn’t much of a rock formation, as they go, but then it wasn’t much of a town, as they go.

Route options in these parts were limited. More specifically, they were limited to Utah Route 261. We rolled along over flat, barren country toward a 1200-foot rock wall off in the distance. As we approached the wall, which spanned the entire horizon, I wondered how the road was going to bypass it. As we grew closer, the answer became ever more apparent—the road wasn’t going to bypass the wall. Rather the road, at this point called the Moki Dugway, scaled it. In nerve-wracking fashion, we took one hairpin, guardrail-less, death-defying curve after another on one of the most “adventurous” stretches of roadway I’d ever traversed.

Once atop the wall, we let out our breath, took some photos, and noticed the incredible change in the scenery. It was practically lush. We drove about another 25 miles to the end of Utah 261 and started west on Utah 95, diverting briefly to explore Natural Bridges National Monument by car and on foot. Natural Bridges isn’t one of the more famous or visited attractions; in fact, it was practically empty, but it contained some impressive natural bridges (what else). Our exploration of the area and its bridges, however, was tempered by our concern for the boys’ safety.

After leaving Natural Bridges, we continued west on Utah 95 toward Torrey, Utah. Over this stretch, for mile after mile and bend after bend, we traveled down a desolate highway through some of the most spectacular scenery I’ve ever beheld. We stopped repeatedly to shoot some video and to take it all in. At one such stop, offering another incredible vista, we met a British couple, who also found the surroundings to be as captivating as any imaginable. I can’t stress that enough.

The road took us high over the Colorado River at Hite Crossing Bridge and then alongside the river. The water seemed completely out of place in this parched country, yet it was such a refreshing deep blue-green and so beautiful. We followed a short spur off Utah 95 to an overlook, believed to be Hite Overlook, that afforded a panoramic view of the water below, the bridge off in the distance, the pale blue sky dotted with white clouds above, and all around that bewitching land of mesas and buttes and rugged barrenness.

From there we drove another 90 miles to the small yet lovely town of Torrey and checked out a few motels, finally settling on the Day’s Inn. And amazingly, it was still daylight. How splendid. After checking into the hotel, we went into town and dined at the Capitol Reef Inn & Café, where we enjoyed what may have been the best meal of the entire trip.

Back at the motel, Sharon and I took the boys to the indoor pool. There was also a hot tub and two kids, who I assumed were brothers but knew for a fact to be complete jerks because they kept jumping in the hot tub and splashing us all. Then we returned to our room, put the boys to bed, watched some TV, and left things to chance.

This was not only the most memorable day of the trip and of the year, but one of the most memorable of all time. It was stunning, startling, spectacular, splendid, and sumptuous.