Santa Cruz and the Jesuit Route

Santa Cruz is the wealthiest city in Bolivia, well, the wealth is reflected in the city center and its greater surroundings. Everything in between is poverty. People live under bridges and in parks. For those who can overlook this, Santa Cruz is definitely a beautiful city. Unfortunately, we couldn't do that, so we didn't enjoy our stay there as much.

Next, we continue towards the Amazon basin along the Jesuit Route. Along this route, there are many Jesuit churches, a total of 6 or 7 churches in 300 kilometers. We had planned to visit only two churches, as after that, the road surface ends anyway, and two churches are enough. Even though we don't usually think much of churches, these churches impressed us a lot. They are not as pompous as our churches, but with their painted walls, they have a similar elegance. Unlike the other conquerors and missionaries, the Jesuits were at least more committed to improving the lives of the indigenous people sustainably. For example, schools were built and houses were modernized (or even built at all), albeit with slave labor from the aforementioned population, a clear case of well-planned but poorly implemented.

This trip took an early and unpleasant end, more about that in another post.