El Camino Real was first blazed in 1691 by Captain Don Domingo Teran de Los Rios, the first provincial governor of Texas, in an expedition officially directed by Father Fray Damian Massanet O.F.M., apostolic missionary and explorer in Texas. Its general route ran northeast from the Rio Grande to the San Antonio River, then across the Guadalupe, San Marcos, Colorado, Brazos, and Trinity Rivers to the missions in east Texas. Other expeditions taking the same route included Espinosa Olivares Aquirre in 1709, St. Denis in 1714, Ramon in 1716, Alarcon in 1718, the Marquis of Aguayo in 1720, and Moses Austin in 1820. The Republic of Texas officially made this road a boundary between a number of empresarial land grants.