As we walk along under the arcade (the covered walkway - although sometimes it is called a portico) of the interior quadrangle garden, look for the carved cross on a section of an old oak tree that once stood on the Mission highway - the El Camino Real (“The King's Highway”). Of course at that time it was only a rough trail. So to help travelers find their way between the missions, the Friars marked the path by carving a cross on prominent (very large) trees along the way.

This marker came from somewhere along the trail between Mission San Luis Obispo to the South and Mission San Antonio to the North. Completely overgrown and hidden from the outside, only when the tree was cut open many years later did the workers find the cross. What a surpise from the Mission's past!

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