The mechanisms and techniques described in this document are directed to a journal that allows a navigation-based application to store and restore state of a resource that is programmatically altered. A resource may invoke code that creates and stores an entry in the journal. The entry includes sufficient information to restore the resource from one state to its prior state. In addition, the entry includes a mechanism for creating another entry to undo any changes made by the first entry. In this manner, the journal includes both entries that identify navigations from one resource to another, and entries may be added to undo changes to a resource to restore the resource to a prior state.