To Stain A Deck

My washed out deck in need of a new stain

Cosmo inspecting the old stain.

It's time to stain my deck.  It took me what seemed like forever to choose the stain color.  My last house was painted with lots of vibrant bright colors; with this house I have been leaning towards black, anything dark, inside or outside.  Too many decisions to make.  Did I want solid, semi-transparent, or transparent stain?  The stain colors are never ending now--perhaps too many choices.  I finally left the store after an hour and some minutes, with two gallons of Sherwin Williams Black Alder solid stain.   Mr. B. had washed the deck two days ago and after a quick sweep I got to work.  I started at 8:30 a.m. and thought I would be done by noon.  Boy was I wrong, those damn railings took forever to do.  Many hours later-I finished the first coat.  But it doesn't look black to me.

It looks brown-gray to me.

Mr. B. says the color reminds him of GunMetal Gray paint.

I am not happy with the color-but there is too much deck to redo.

Maybe the second coat will change the look.  Looks like Betty Boop is in need of some touch up too!