Spanish Entrada Site

The state monument the panel points to was named for Coronado, though he may never have camped at Kuaua, the northernmost Tiwa town, whose name means evergreen. What it preserves is the town's own work. Digging between 1934 and 1940, archaeologists found a square kiva plastered more than eighty-five times, seventeen of the coats painted with animals and religious figures. The layers were lifted off and saved, and fourteen fragments hang in the visitor center, opened for the 1940 Coronado anniversary. By agreement with the pueblos, only the rabbit may be reproduced.

What the plaque says

Official Scenic Historic Marker Spanish Entrada Site Among the many prehistoric and historic sites located nearby is a camp where Francisco Vasquez de Coronado's troops may have spent the winter of 1540 - 41. Coronado also visited the ancient pueblo of Kuaua located to the north. Kuaua's ruins are preserved and interpreted at the Coronado State Monument near Bernalillo.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Petroglyph National Monument — 15 mi
  Some 24,000 images pecked into the dark basalt of Albuquerque's West Mesa, protected in 1990 and then crossed by a city boulevard.

More markers nearby

• Bernalillo — 2.0 mi
• Dulcelina Salce Curtis (1904-1995) — 2.6 mi
• Bernalillo — 2.9 mi
• Tiguex Province — 3.1 mi