A Layover in Santa Cruz

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While Bolivia is much closer than Uganda it has been a challenge to actually get there.

There is only one airline: Bolivian Air that regularly flies into the country. I would best describe them as Spirit Airlines of South America. My flight left out of Miami, but from a tired old terminal I had never been to before. i had an overnight flight to Santa Cruz, the largest city in Bolivia at 3.3M residents.

I arrived at 5:00am and proceeded to get a Visa ($160 USD for Americans) and clear customs. I then had a 12 hour layover until the next flight. My original plan was to get the luggage checked back in and head into town to see the sites. But, there are currently protests going on in Santa Cruz making it very difficult to get around.

Many of the roads are blocked so the taxi driver had to zig zag back and forth on dirt roads and then at one point we were driving the wrong way on the main road because drivers couldn't get to the other side. Many of the road blocks are DIY - such as a bunch of tires or a pile of concrete. Some roads were being blocked by families that charge a small fee to proceed. The taxi driver said the money is shared amongst the neighbors.

There was just enough time to grab a coffee and breakfast before heading back to the airport to avoid larger planned road blocks.

As I understand it, the protests are being organized by activists affiliated with the Pro Santa Cruz Committee. The protests started on Oct 22nd and are indefinite. The last strike like this lasted 31 days. The purpose of the protests is to demand that a national census be taken in 2023 instead of the government's current plan for a census in 2024 after it was canceled for November of 2022. There was some violence on the evening of Oct 22nd, but since then it has been peaceful with the main goal of blocking traffic in and out of the city center.

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Comments

[Elyse]

Glad you are safe!