It’s not even been 72 hours since we returned from our 4th of July jaunt to Utah, and we are already bouncing right back out, this time to Santa Fe, New Mexico. Right now, it’s only 8:00 in the morning, and I pulled into the coffee shop to race through prepping a few more photos from last weekend and jot down the beginning of another departure. At the moment, I don’t have a firm idea of what time we’ll be leaving Phoenix as Caroline has to finish her work day, but I’d guess that we’ll hit the road somewhere between 3:00 and 5:00. Our plan has us driving to Gallup, New Mexico, this afternoon, but if we can go further, that’d be terrific. So, with this first note of the day in the bag, it’s time to turn my attention to completing a few more photos before making my way home to pack.

Caroline was ready at 3:00 p.m., but this time, I was running behind because I had the bright idea at 2:15 to take advantage of a sale that Verizon had just sent to me. I had less than 72 hours to respond to an $800 discount on a new Samsung S22 Ultra phone upgrade. Normally, I’d be getting $35 in trade for my old S9+ (I know this because I checked a month ago), so I went through the motions, and the new phone should be in Monday’s mail.

With that business out of the way, I picked up the wife, and at 3:30, we made our way to Starbucks in Fountain Hills and then turned on the BeeLine highway towards Payson. Deja vu was in effect as we were on the exact same route, only in reverse, that we just drove on Monday. It was already 6:00 p.m. when I flipped the blinker to turn north on Highway 277, in the direction of Holbrook, when I blurted out that we should pull a quick U-turn and have dinner at this place we’ve often passed but never had stopped. With low expectations, we did just that.

Al & Diane’s Red Onion Lounge in Heber-Overgaard was our dinner stop. This iconic and “Famous” roadside joint has been here forever and was exactly what we expected: a slightly different version of our favorite old haunt in Phoenix that was once known as Wagon Yard. With the evening’s vittles out of the way, we could continue on into the late day.

I thought we might make it to Grants, New Mexico, tonight, but with 60 miles left, we opted for our original destination of Gallup, New Mexico. We found a cheap room at EconoLodge for the low-low price of only $59; this was likely the best deal we were going to get. We have a 3-hour drive ahead of us in the morning, meaning we’ll be getting up with the rising sun so we can be on the road by 6:00 a.m.