New Mexico is full of history from many eras. The three ruins sites preserved by Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument offer the visitor a glimpse into the meeting of the Puebloan and Spanish cultures that dates to the 1600s.
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Our Visit. I visited Salinas Pueblo Missions NM in late September as part of a road trip across New Mexico
Our Weather. 70s and sunny
The church at Quarai is remarkably well preserved
Overall Impression. Salinas Pueblo Missions is actually three sites separated by several miles, but each is a little miniature national park by itself with a visitors center, museum, ruins and an easy walking path. Each site is part of the story of the meeting of two cultures in the 1600s, the native Puebloans who built complex and connected pueblos out of mud and stone, and the Spanish priests and settlers who built missions near each village to try to convert the natives to Christianity and mold the Native Americans into proper Spanish citizens. These sites saw some mutually beneficial sharing between the two, but they also saw revolts and death before they were overrun by the Apache and abandoned. I was impressed by how interesting and well kept the sites are, and whether you can only see one or all three, they’re a great stop for anyone traveling through central New Mexico.
Remarkable examples of Puebloan pottery at Gran Quivera
Visiting. Salinas Pueblo Missions NM is pretty remote, so its someplace you have to plan to visit, but once you get there, visiting these ruins is a great experience. First, to save some time, you can safely skip the Visitor Center and Park HQ in Mountainair, NM–while there is a Ranger on duty and a small museum and gift shop, you can get all the information you need at each site. The three sites are Abo, Quarai, and Gran Quivera. Abo is the most convenient, Gran Quivera the least, and Quarai is somewhere in the middle. I had time to visit two, so I chose Quarai because the ruins looked appealing and Gran Quivera because it was somewhat on my route to Alamogordo and White Sands NP. While I hope to get to Abo someday, I wasn’t disappointed with my choices.
I visited Quarai first, and I had the park to myself. It’s tucked into a pretty little area of grass, trees and rolling terrain, and the red ruins are easy to see even from the parking lot. Take a minute to visit the tiny museum in the visitors center where you can see models of the pueblo in its full glory. The walk to the ruins is about 1/4 mile round trip, and the path is easy. You can walk right through the ruins of the church and its surrounding structures, but the pueblo ruins are harder to spot and off the trail. The rooms can be a bit of a rat maze, so don’t be surprised if you hit a few dead-ends and have to backtrack (you can see over the walls, so don’t worry about getting lost). The whole experience takes about 30 minutes.
Looking across the ruins of the pueblo at Gran Quivera
After Quarai, I drove about 45 minutes to Gran Quivera. The terrain here is much more rocky and dry than Quarai, and the ruins here are gray instead of the red of the other two sites. While the focal point of both Abo and Quarai is the church ruins, Gran Quivira highlights the Puebloan ruins. Start at the visitors center taking a few minutes to look around the small museum which houses some beautiful examples of native pottery. The path here has more elevation change than Quarai, but it’s still very manageable. The church ruins are not as impressive, but the path winds through great examples of classic pueblo architecture. The signs along the path here also shed more light on the life of the native peoples.
Suggestions. This area is remote! As long as your phone has service, it will guide you to the right spots, but I had zero service at Gran Quivera which left me unable to map my way to Alamogordo when I was done visiting. If you don’t know this area well, make sure you download offline maps before you run out of cell service. Because it’s remote, you’ll also want to make sure you bring your own food and water for hiking.
Nearby Towns Mountainair, Albuquerque (NM)
Other Nearby Attractions Petroglyph NM, Pecos NHP
Official NPS Website Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument
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- There are no ruins at the visitor center, but there is a small museum
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- View of the Quarai ruins
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- The church at Quarai is remarkably well preserved
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- Closeup of some of the rooms connected to the church at Quarai
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- Kiva ruins at Quarai
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- A look at the small but impressive museum in the tiny visitor center at Quarai
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- A model showing what Quarai looked like at its height
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- Looking through the doors of what was once the Spanish mission church at Gran Quivera
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- Looking across the ruins of the pueblo at Gran Quivera
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- Ruins surrounding the church at Gran Quivera
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- Remarkable examples of Puebloan pottery at Gran Quivera
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