Day 67 - 10 Feb.2012 - San Ignacio

After our own breakfast, we learned a bit of the history of the town from the friendly guy at the reception. It appears that at this very place the troops of Uruguay, Argentina and Brazil went across the river to invade Paraguay, which is just on the other side. The town was then called Paso del Rey and was later on renamed Paso de la Patria. We drove through the village in search for some historical places giving evidence of the historic past. We found a building, which in the past was a small military hospital just next to the village church. Later at about 11AM we left direction Pousadas.
On our way we read in the travel guide that shortly after Pousadas are some ruins of Jesuits villages from the early years of colonisation of South America.
Since 1609 for one and a half centuries the Jesuits were living with the Guarani Indians. Although the main aim was as well to Christianise the natives, the Jesuits accepted the Guarani way of life and allowed them to continue to speak their own language, which was not well seen by the Crown. The Guarani always liked music and dance and embraced the new way of music from the Jesuits, probably the element, which attracted them most to Catholicism. Eventually, the Jesuits were expelled from the area because of their way of working and living with the Indians. Once the padres were gone the settlements were unprotected and gradually dispersed.
Today some ruins are still visible in Santa Ana giving a good idea of how the settlement was laid out.
We continued our way to San Ignacio, our final destination for today, were a further Jesuits settlement is still visible. In contrast to the one in Santa Ana, this one was partly restored and more of the stone buildings could be visited.