Santa Fe National Historic Trail
Colorado, New Mexico, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma
Tonight
🌗 46% moon
6.7 h fully dark
Hikes
Easy
🟢
Open today
Open
Entrance
Free entry
You can almost hear the whoops and cries of "All's set!" as trail hands hitched their oxen to freight wagons carrying cargo between western Missouri and Santa Fe, New Mexico. Follow the Santa Fe National Historic Trail through five states and you'll find adventure and evidence of past travelers who made this remarkable trip before you!
Activities
Topics
No entrance fee.
Hours & seasons
There are many places of history and commemoration on the Santa Fe National Historic Trail to visit. Museums, interpretive centers, and historic sites provide information and interpretation. Please contact each site before you go to obtain current information on closures, changes in hours, and fees.
Generally open:
winterspringsummerfallHours are reported by the park — verify before you go.
Conditions
Weather now: ☀️ Clear, 85°F
🌧️ 97°/68°
⛅ 101°/71°
☁️ 107°/74°
Log a sky reading
Measured the sky with an SQM meter or app? Add your reading (16 = city glow … 22 = pristine). Opt in under “Travelers like you” to share it on the community leaderboard.
Things to do
🟢 Trail to History
Become a Santa Fe Trail Junior Ranger
Hike on the Santa Fe Trail · 15 mi
View Landmarks along the Santa Fe Trail
View Santa Fe Trail Ruts
Visit Historic Sites on the Santa Fe Trail
Check Out Museums and Visitor Centers along the Santa Fe Trail
Accessibility
70 audio-described place(s)
Reported by the park — verify before you go.
Not an official safety source — always defer to NPS.gov and rangers for life-safety decisions.
By the numbers
A visual read on Santa Fe National Historic Trail — its character, trails, sky, and weather.
Park fingerprint
How this park scores across the dimensions travelers care about.
Trail difficulty
Difficulty mix across this park's trails.
3-day forecast
Daily high and low temperatures (°F).
People & stories
Figures tied to Santa Fe National Historic Trail — each spans a cross-park journey.
Carmel Benavides
— Santa Fe Trail, Santa Fe National Historic Trail, PeopleCathay Williams
— Travel Americas Diverse Cultures Travel Itinerary, Cultural And Ethnic Diversity, Religious DiversityDon Felipe Chavez
— Santa Fe Trail, Hispanic Heritage, Latino American HeritageEmily Fisher
— Santa Fe Trail, Santa Fe National Historic Trail, Oregon TrailFlora Langerman Spiegelberg
— Santa Fe Trail, National Trails, Womens HistoryFrancisca López
— Santa Fe Trail, People, Historic TrailsHiram Young
— Santa Fe Trail, California Trail, Oregon TrialJulia Archibald Holmes
— Santa Fe Trail, Women, SuffragePassport stamps
Mark the stamps you've collected — they show in your memory and along your routes.
🎫 Alexander Majors House
🎫 Arrow Rock State Historic Site Visitor Center
🎫 Barton County Historical Society Museum
🎫 Boggsville Historic Site
🎫 Boot Hill Museum
🎫 Cimarron
🎫 Cimarron National Grassland
🎫 Coronado Quivira Museum
🎫 Council Grove, Kansas
🎫 Fort Larned National Historic Site, the Santa Fe Trail
🎫 Fort Union National Monument, the Santa Fe Trail
🎫 Harry S Truman National Historic Site, the Santa Fe Trail
🎫 Herzstein Memorial Museum
🎫 Independence Courthouse Square
🎫 Independence Courthouse Square- Truman Courthouse
🎫 Kaw Mission State Historic Site
🎫 Kiowa and Rita Blanca National Grasslands
🎫 Lanesfield Historic Site
🎫 Las Vegas Santa Fe Trail Interpretive Center
🎫 Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop & Farm Historic Site
🎫 Morton County Historical Society Museum
🎫 Museum of Spanish Colonial Art
🎫 National Frontier Trails Museum
🎫 New Mexico Public Lands Information Center
🎫 Old Santa Fe Trail Building
🎫 Palace of the Governors at the New Mexico History Museum
🎫 Pecos National Historical Park
🎫 Santa Fe National Historic Trail
🎫 Santa Fe Trail Center
🎫 Shawnee Indian Mission State Historic Site, Fairway
🎫 Timpas Unit, Comanche National Grassland
🎫 Trailside Center, Kansas City
Places to see
100th Meridian Marker
3 Trails Greenway, Hickman Mills School District Segment, Kansas City
audio
Albert Gallatin Boone’s Trading Post and Jim Bridger Store
Alexander Majors House
audio
Alfred Bergere House (Georgia O’Keeffe Research Center)
Amache National Historic Site, the Santa Fe Trail
audio
Arrow Rock Ferry Landing
audio
Arrow Rock State Historic Site Visitor Center
audio
Autograph Rock
audio
Barnes Enclosure and Cave Spring Interpretive Center
Barrio de Analco Historic District, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Barton County Historical Society Museum
Audio & media
🎧 Kansas City - Jumping off the River Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 3 mintranscript
🎧 Black Jack Ruts Orientation Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 8 mintranscript
🎧 Museum of Spanish Colonial Art - Trade Transforms Art Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 4 mintranscript
🎧 Kansas City - From Missouri to the West Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 3 mintranscript
🎧 Kansas City - Engines of Change Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 4 mintranscript
🎧 Kansas City - Port to the West Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 5 mintranscript
🎧 Kansas City - Trail Economy Exhibit Audio Description ↗ · 3 mintranscript
🎧 Black Jack Ruts Audio Tour Stop 6 ↗ · 1 mintranscript
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Learn more
Volunteers and partners made the Santa Fe Trial 200th Anniversary a success! In this video, National Trails office staff say “thank you” to the many people who devoted their time and energy to the trail’s bicentennial.
The Old Santa Fe Trail Building is now used as a regional headquarters for the National Park Service. The large adobe building, built in the 1930s with New Deal Labor, blends into the surrounding landscape. Courtyards, exterior adobe and stucco walls, and planting features define the cultural landscape. The building takes its name from the proximity to the Santa Fe National Historic Trail, which was used primarily between 1821 and 1880.
Often when we think about the Santa Fe Trail, bison and rattlesnakes come to mind. Both served key roles in the ecosystems and experiences of Trail travelers, but they are just the beginning of the diverse animals that have been found along the Santa Fe Trail. Learn more about animals along the Santa Fe Trail!
Interested in the Santa Fe Trail at Autograph Rock? Take a look at these interpretive exhibits and listen to their audio descriptions.
Learn about the National Historic Trails and earn junior ranger badges! These activities can be completed virtually or after visiting a site along the National Historic Trails. Booklets can be submitted either electronically or by mail. Take a look and start exploring the trails today!
When we think of the Santa Fe Trail, we usually imagine wagons rolling across a prairie. Yet in some ways, it’s just as accurate to think of a bustling city like New York, Philadelphia, or Baltimore. The trail was part of a robust international trade network influenced by a range of people, cultures, and places.
Welcome to the Ivan Boyd Memorial Prairie Preserve and the Black Jack Ruts. Head out on the trail through the woods and over the small creek to the prairie. From there you can walk a gravel trail that is easy walking and will let you experience up close and in person several very impressive wagon ruts created by heavy traffic of mostly freight wagons headed to Santa Fe or returning to Westport or Franklin or merchants along the Missouri River.
Explore the exhibits at Black Jack Ruts through images and audio descriptions.
Ranger School
Park-grounded courses you can learn with the Ranger.
Pathways and Perspectives: National Historic Trails Multiday Lesson Plan
Open →
Riding the Rails and Traveling the Trails: Grades 4, 7, 12
Open →
Santafetrail.org Activities and Lessons
Open →
Trading on the Santa Fe Trail
Open →
Traveling the Oregon and Santa Fe Trails
Open →
How Santa Fe National Historic Trail connects
This park's activities, topics, location, and on-the-ground places — one hop in the graph. Drag to explore; click an activity, topic, or related park to follow it.
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