In Nueva Andalusia the new Governor after Ordaz, Gerónimo Ortal, and after him Sedeño, Governor of Trinidad, were also exploring the Llanos and endeavouring to settle that region, but the previous evil deeds of the Cubaguans had made the task very difficult, if not impossible. Before long these received a just reward for their crimes, in a succession of natural catastrophes, which ultimately drove the remnant from the island. In 1530 an earthquake shook the town and destroyed many buildings, not without loss of life, and in 1543 earthquake and hurricane together wrought so much havoc to life and property that only a few lingered on, persisting in the slave trade, for which New Cadiz was notorious, until at last the population decreased to nil in 1550; even the exact site of the city is now unknown. One important man appears on the scene from Margarita, about 1555, in Francisco Faxardo, the son of a Spaniard of noble birth who had wedded a princess of the Guaiquerias. Crossing to the coasts of the Carácas, he established friendly relations with the Teques and other Indians, and in 1560 built the Villa de San Francisco, approximately where the capital of Venezuela now stands, together with the Villa de El Collado (Pablo Collado being the Governor in Coro), afterwards Caraballeda, about eight miles east of La Guaira. Under the Spanish Governors who succeeded the Welsers, the already evident tendency to leave the barren plains of Coro for the more fruitful territory to the east and south became more marked. Mérida had been founded in 1542, Borburata (Puerto Cabello) in 1549, Nueva Segovia (Barquisimeto) in 1552, and Nueva Valencia, on the shores of Lake Tacarigua, in 1555, with Trujillo in 1556, while the mines of San Felipe and Nirgua had been known and worked for some years.