Exploring the lost Camino Real

Both historical investigation and travelogue, this documented study of the end of the Camino Real and San Blas, Mexico, is woven into the author’s personal account of the search for remnants of Mexico’s colonial road in the lowlands and sierras of modern Nayarit, aided and accompanied in his excursions by various regional historians, local guides, and curious companions. And like the old road running through the contemporary landscape, the historical narrative merges into the story of the region’s modern character and development. To explore Nayarit’s wild and gorgeous geography, trying to site the ancient Camino Real, is to stumble over another road running toward the state’s future economic development as part of the Mexican Riviera. Nearly five hundred years after the Spanish conquest of Mexico, the history of San Blas and the road to get there is still being written. This is a contemporary narrative portrait. This historical work completes a trilogy of books by Robert Richter centered on the fading coastal village culture of Nayarit and the Mexican Riviera. It is the first comprehensive study of San Blas region in English since 1967.

The author of eight books, including poetry, fiction, and regional history, Robert Richter has a forty-year relationship with Mexico, and that cultural geography inspires his work. In 2000, Richter won the Nebraska Arts Council’s Literary Achievement Award, and in 2007, he was a Fulbright Research Fellow in Buenos Aires. Richter has also been a wheat farmer, substitute teacher, and tour guide in Latin America.