Sinaloa de Leyva

Sinaloa de Leyva is the seat of Sinaloa municipality, on the banks of the Sinaloa (or Petatlán) River about 42 km northeast of Guasave. Pedro de Montoya founded it on April 30, 1583 as the Villa de San Felipe y Santiago de Sinaloa, and it was founded a second time in 1585 by Antonio Ruiz and four companions. By 1590 only nine settlers were scraping by, but the arrival of the Jesuits Gonzalo de Tapia and Martín Pérez in 1591 and the discovery of the Chínipas mines turned things around. In 1595 the viceroy Luis de Velasco approved a presidio, and Captain Alonso Díaz arrived with 24 soldiers; it remained New Spain's northwesternmost garrison until 1689. From here Diego de Hurdaide subdued the Sinaloa, Tehueco, Ahome and Zuaque peoples and pushed Spanish control up to the Fuerte River. The town was once the state capital, and its name honors Gabriel Leyva Solano, born here and remembered as the first martyr of the Mexican Revolution: he was killed on June 13, 1910, and the country's first anti-reelection club was organized in this town.

In 1635 the Jesuits built the town's first church, with a college attached that became a religious and cultural center for the whole northwest and the starting point of a chain of missions reaching Baja California and northern Sonora. A river flood destroyed it, but the ruins of the Templo Viejo still show stone foundations and walls. The cobbled streets are lined with 19th-century houses in styles running from neoclassical to the eclectic taste of the Porfirio Díaz years. Around the main square are the town hall, the Casa de la Cultura and the old tower known as the Torre Vieja, and at the entrance to town a statue of the Virgin of Guadalupe crowns Cerro del Monje, a lookout over the rooftops.

A riverside promenade has seafood restaurants and snack stands, and catamaran rides leave from it, popular at sunset. Across the suspension bridge, bakers sell pan de mujer from wood-fired ovens. The countryside has places to cool off: Los Sabinos park, with big trees and river water; the El Caimán, Maripa and Baburia creeks; mineral springs at Agua Caliente de Cota and Las Pilas; and, about 48 km away, the Bacurato dam, where anglers catch largemouth bass and tilapia. Near Bacubirito, at Porohui, El Cajón has natural pools and small waterfalls.