Old Spanish Trail

Everything on the Old Spanish Trail bent toward water, and in this valley the water was here. The Las Vegas Springs fed meadows of grass in the middle of the desert—las vegas, the meadows—and for the pack trains running between Santa Fe and Los Angeles after 1829, this was the essential stop. Animals drank and grazed before and after the worst dry stretches; men rested in an oasis that had drawn the Southern Paiute for centuries. Without these springs the trail through southern Nevada would not have existed. The meadows are built over, but the springs survive nearby.

What the plaque says

Stretching for 130 miles across Clark County, this historic horse trail became Nevada’s first route of commerce in 1829 when trade was initiated between Santa Fe and Los Angeles. The trail was later used by the wagons of the “49ers” and by Mormon pioneers. Concrete posts marking the trail were erected in 1965.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• The Neon Museum — 0.5 mi
  The Neon Boneyard — where the Strip''s discarded signs are rescued and lit again
• Old Las Vegas Mormon Fort State Historic Park — 0.5 mi
  The 1855 adobe fort where Las Vegas began — a mile and a world away from the neon
• The Mob Museum — 0.7 mi
  Organized crime, told in the downtown courtroom that first exposed it
• Fremont Street — 1.0 mi
  Glitter Gulch — the neon canyon where Las Vegas actually began

More markers nearby

• Las Vegas Mormon Fort (Nevada’s Oldest Building) — steps away
• The Morelli House — 1.1 mi
• Original Home of “Pop” Squires (1865-1958) — 1.2 mi
• Kyle (Kiel) Ranch — 1.6 mi