Presidio Santa Cruz De Terrenate

Today we took a hike out into the desert to the ruins of this Presidio which dates from 1775 and was used until 1780. It is about one and a half miles from the trail head where we parked the car. The trail is good but lots of rocks for a good part of the trip. The last portion is along an abandoned railway bed.
The spanish moved to this location from one south of here. They wanted to exert control over this area which had been the home of the Apache indians. They brought some 80 soldiers who were basically calvary men with lances and each one had 5 horses. Among those who came were some mission indians to help with the construction of the adobe structures and some civilians who did not want to be left behind with no protection.

The site they picked was on a bluff overlooking a river. It was a very defensible position in a military sense. The problem was the Apache would not confront them in the fort. They would raid the horse herds, harrrass the supply trains, attack the farmers that tried to farm to supply the presidio, attack those going to the river for water, etc. Basically they conducted guerilla war and the Spanish could not sustain the fort long term so it was finally abandoned in 1780 and the Spanish retreated to the south.
In a way this helped the Americans later when they were acquiring this regon in the Gadsden Purchase from the Mexicans. The Mexicans wanted protection for their people from the Apache and other maurading indians and the Americans promised to do this.
As you can see the weather over the last 200 years has taken a toll on the adobe structures.

We enjoyed the hike and the visit to the ruins, but we discovered how out of shape we were! It is not like walking on the paved roads here in the RV park. Lots of up and down and around the rocks. Oh well, we will get into better shape as we do this more.