Skeleton Canyon

Skeleton Canyon, called Cañon Bonita by the Mexicans, is located 30 miles (50 km) northeast of the town of Douglas, Arizona, in the Peloncillo Mountains, which straddle the modern Arizona and New Mexico state line, in the New Mexico Bootheel region.

This canyon connects the Animas Valley of New Mexico with the San Simon Valley of Arizona, and was once a main route between the United States and Mexico for both legal and illegal traffic. While originally known as Guadalupe Canyon, the area came to be called Skeleton Canyon, owing to the bones of cows and humans left behind by cattle drives from Mexico.