East of the city of Durango, where the high plateau of northern Mexico stretches flat and wide under a vast sky, the old hacienda of San Diego de Navacoyán stands among irrigated fields and dusty farm roads. Its buildings, with thick adobe walls, a chapel and the remains of the main house, recall the centuries when great landed estates dominated this region, raising cattle, growing wheat and supplying the mining towns of the north. The hacienda is one of the sites listed as part of the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro, the Royal Road of the Interior Land, which UNESCO inscribed in 2010. This was the long trade and colonisation route that ran from Mexico City north to Santa Fe in present-day New Mexico, more than two thousand kilometres through deserts and mountains.
Durango was founded in the sixteenth century as a frontier town, a base for silver mining and for the push north into what were then the lands of nomadic indigenous peoples. Its old centre has a fine cathedral and colonial buildings, and the surrounding landscape became famous in the twentieth century as a backdrop for Hollywood westerns, with film sets still standing in the desert outside the city. The haciendas along the Camino Real were essential for supplying travellers, mule trains and wagons.
Riding here is about space. The roads east of Durango are long and straight, crossing a high plain at around 1,900 metres, with mountains on the horizon and very little traffic away from the main highways. It can be windy, and the sun is fierce at this altitude, so cover up and drink plenty. Toward the west, the famous road from Durango to Mazatlán crosses the Sierra Madre Occidental with hundreds of curves and spectacular views, including the stretch known as the Espinazo del Diablo, now supplemented by a modern highway with tunnels and a huge bridge.
The hacienda lies in a rural area, so fuel and supplies are best taken care of in Durango, a city of over half a million people about eleven kilometres away. The city has everything, from fuel to restaurants to accommodation. Local dishes include caldillo duranguense, a beef stew with chilli, and gorditas. Ride out in the morning, when the light on the adobe walls is soft and warm, walk around the old buildings, and picture the mule trains plodding north toward the frontier.