In 1541, the Spanish explorer Coronado is thought to have passed this way en route from New Mexico to the fabled Indian villages of Quivira, though his path across the vast Texas plains is now difficult to determine. After finding that his Indian guide, The Turk, had taken him too far south, Coronado halted at a small canyon or barranca, conferred with his captains, and decided to follow the compass directly north. When they reached Quivira, possibly in Kansas, no gold was found, only the poor grass huts of a Wichita village.