Oh, I am sorry to hear this. I just re stained my picnic table with a color that looks very much like your deck. Of course, the table won't get footprints on it, hopefully! We're building a new deck and the plan is to use a dark gray stain, I would think the darker color would not show up the dirt so much. Our old deck was stained a dark brown, and was pretty good at not looking dirty all the time. I am hoping a dark gray will be the same. I wouldn't paint, I think the paint will peel over time, which will mean scraping, sanding, etc when its time to repaint.

Solid Color Stain is no different than paint on a deck surface, no bueno............

Dark grey sounds the way to go, Iam702. The guy at the paint store says you can't add stain to existing stain without sanding down and starting again. I think we'll get deck rugs....

We used solid stain on our old deck, about every 7 yrs or so. Just cleaned it, and brushed it on right over the old stain. No problems with it at all, no peeling or chipping. . If my deck didn't need replacing, I would restain it again, but its 31 yrs old, boards are getting cracks so its time for a new one.

That's encouraging. I fund this comment online, Most oil base and latex stains can be recoated at any time provided the surface is clean. Most waterborne deck coatings must be recoated within a certain time frame or not until the stain has either been removed by cleaning or worn off by weather. Generally if water won't bead up on the surface, it's ok to restain." The BM stain we used was latex - I think we'll try a small patch and see if the darker grey takes....

After 31 years, I think you are due a new deck...