After making sure that we had everything packed, we checked out of the hotel and loaded our bags into the Jeep.  We were finally going home.

Of course, there is no way that would just drive straight home, not when there was still so much to see along the way.  En route, we planned to visit two more National Parks: Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site, and Petrified Forest National Park.  That would bring our total to thirteen national parks visited during our trip, over an eleven day period. 

Our first stop was Hubbell Trading Post, located outside of the town of Ganado along US 191, about forty miles from Chinle.  It took us about an hour to get there from the hotel. 

The Hubbell Trading Post was a very interesting piece of land, filled with history.  Many of the historic buildings on the land are still intact and are open for tours.  The trading post itself has a general store that sells not only groceries but specialty items as well, such as habanero garlic and habanero mustard (we bought one of each).  There was also a shop that sells Native American crafts, made at the trading post. 

Behind the trading post, we found two old homes that had been preserved for their historic value, as well as some old artifacts: a bread oven, some old rusted plows, and even an old wagon.  It did have a chicken coop with live chickens in it, and in the barn, there were horses, too.

Across from the trading post was the Park Service visitor's center, where we took Mary to get her stamp.  Inside, we found a Native American woman working on a loom, making a blanket.  We were allowed to watch her work, but we could not take pictures of her or of her work.

We only spent about one hour at the trading post; after that, it was off to our next destination: Petrified Forest National Park.

Located near the town of Holbrook on I-40, Petrified Forest National Park (as well as the beautiful Painted Desert) would be the last stop on our monumental journey.  To get there, we took US 191 south from Ganado to I-40; then we took I-40 west to the northern park entrance, located just off of the freeway off ramp.

After showing our park pass at the gate, we drove into Petrified Forest National Park and stopped immediately at the visitor's center to obtain our last stamp.  While we were there, we took a tour in the museum, where we were encouraged to touch the petrified wood samples that were on display there.  (We were not, however, supposed to touch the samples located with in the park, along the trails.  Touching the displays in the museum was their way of "getting it out of your system" first.)

Having obtained a map of the park at the gate, we planned out our day.  Our first stop in the park was the Painted Desert, to take pictures of the beautiful red, orange, and purple-hued hills that make up the desert there.  John explained that there were several backpacking trails along the way that would probably be a lot of fun to do...but they would be dry backpacking trips, because there was no water to be found out in that desert.

Next, we stopped at Agate Bridge: a fallen tree that had become fossilized into petrified wood.  The bridge was not visible from the road; to see it, we had to hike a short trail from the parking lot to the tree.  It was neat, but not nearly as impressive as what lay in store ahead of us.

Our next stop was to hike through an old pueblo of crumbled ruins, along a paved trail.  Unlike Aztec Ruins or Wupatki, these ruins had not been as well preserved; most of the walls had been completely razed, and all that was left were two foot piles of rocks.  At the end of the trail, though, was an impressive sight: engraved onto the blackened boulders, just below the pueblo, were beautiful petroglyphs.  They were everywhere!  The whole place was littered with them.  We found more of them at Newspaper Rock, across the road; John stopped there, too, to take pictures of them.

The highlight of the trip, however, was the petrified wood, and to see it, we did a 0.8 mile hike on the Crystal Forest Trail, located along the main road of the park.  The Crystal Forest Trail contained the largest concentration of petrified wood, so this was the place to go to see the wood.

The trail was an easy one - paved for the most part, and mainly flat - and it was, as promised, very impressive.  There were giant logs of petrified wood strewn all about the trail - at some points, the trail was even lined with humongous petrified logs.  Mary certainly loved the wood...and that was probably why it wasn't an easy task keeping her from touching it!

John used this opportunity to play with the digital camera a bit, by taking some close-up shots of the fossilized wood.  He was fascinated with the marble-like texture found within the wood, and when photographed close up, it was quite beautiful. 

We completed the trail in about a half an hour; by that time, it was getting close to lunch, so we decided to drive into Holbrook for a bite to eat before beginning our long drive home.  With that, we left Petrified Forest National Park and continued along I-40 to Holbrook.

As a reward to Mary for being so good during our road trip, we stopped at McDonald's for lunch.  There, she completely ignored her Chicken McNuggets and opted instead to wear herself out on the playground equipment.  We didn't mind at all, because it meant that she would take a nice, long nap in the car.  In fact, she was asleep before we reached Winslow; and she slept all the way from Winslow to Clint's Well (on SR 87). 

We took SR 87 all the way home, stopping only in Payson to use the restroom.  Our long journey was finally over, and we were glad to be home again.

That meant that it was time to celebrate John's birthday (it was, after all, September 30).  We had left his birthday presents at home, so that we didn't have to carry them with us throughout our long trip.  That night, Mary and I gave him the Jimmy Buffett box set that he had always wanted, and we also cooked him up a nice steak dinner - a home-cooked steak dinner, the first home-cooked meal in eleven days!  Not long after dinner, the three of us went to sleep in our own beds, happy to be home after such an incredible adventure.

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