You drive back along the washboard dirt road to the main highway and continue on your hunt for Ghost Towns. 3.8 miles after turning back onto NM-14 you turn off for Cerrillos, New Mexico. Not much remains of this once booming town but a small main street. Most of the buildings are abandoned, but a few stores and a church remain.
Cerrillos was first settled as a mining town. Turquoise was mined in an open pit here. In the nearby Ortiz Mountains, gold was mined in the 1820's. Along with gold fever and the Santa Fe Railroad, this town grew around 1879. With silver, copper, gold, lead, zinc and turquoise in the mountains the town soon boasted twenty-one saloons and four hotels. Cerrillos was once seriously considered as the Capitol of New Mexico.