Bolivia: Driving in Santa Cruz Province

While Bolivia conjures images of high elevation, mountains, altiplano and alpacas – driving east from Santa Cruz de la Sierra is totally different – vast plans of undulating agricultural fields and pastures with scattered patches of dry tropical forest. Cattle ranching is also pronounced here with massive humped bulls being grown solely for export as choice beef. Santa Cruz department is vast – bigger than Germany – and is the breadbasket of the Bolivian economy with soy, sugarcane, sorghum, sunflower, beef, poultry, and rice. If that wasn’t enough – this is where huge fields of oil and gas lie as well.