| Once, thriving American Indian trade communities of Tiwa and Tompiro speaking Puebloans inhabited this remote frontier area of central New Mexico. Early in the 17th-century Spanish Franciscans found the area ripe for their missionary efforts. However, by the late 1670s the entire Salinas District, as the Spanish had named it, was depopulated of both Indian and Spaniard. What remains today are austere yet beautiful reminders of this earliest contact between Pueblo Indians and Spanish Colonials: the ruins of four mission churches, at Quarai, Abó, and Gran Quivira and the partially excavated pueblo of Las Humanas or, as it is known today, Gran Quivira. Established in 1980 through the combination of two New Mexico State Monuments and the former Gran Quivira National Monument, the present Monument comprises a total of 1,100 acres.
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| Directions: | Plane - To Park: Air transportation, Amtrak, and bus service to Albuquerque. Access by Interstate Highways (I-40, I-25), state highway (NM 55, NM 60), and National Park Service access roads.
Car - DIRECTIONS: The Mountainair headquarters can be reached by taking I-25 south from Albuquerque to Belen, then NM 47 diagonally to US 60, then east 21 miles to Mountainair. To travel the historic highway route from the north, take I-40 east from Albuquerque to NM 337, drive south 54 miles to Mountainair. Information on the Quarai, Abó, and Gran Quivira ruins, as well as the surrounding area, are provided by National Park Service rangers at all three ruins and park headquarters. Abó: Ruins are 9 miles west on US 60 and one-half mile north on NM 513. Telephone: (505) 847-2400. Gran Quivira: Ruins are 26 miles south on NM 55. Telephone: (505) 847-2770. Quarai: Ruins are 8 miles north on NM 55 and 1 mile west. Telephone: (505) 847-2290.
Public Transportation - In Park: No commercial
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