I had the plan to visit both Loreto and San Ignacio Miní from Posadas including the light show in the evening and afterwards return to Posadas. I will highlight upfront: It worked out fine with public transportation!

Taking the bus from Posadas bus terminal which is about 5 km south of town center- easily reached by public buses- in the direction of Puerto Iguazù, I jumped off the bus in the middle of the highway 12 at a junction leading towards the really small village of Loreto. It´s about 45 minutes walk on the laterite dirt road until you reach the entrance gate of Loreto mission. I was almost the only one there at 3 p.m. on a sunny Wednesday. There is a visitor center with a 3D map of the mission where a female guide caught me and started introducing me to the mission. First of all I highlighted that I would like to go afterwards to San Igancio Miní which made her suggest that there is a 4 p.m. public bus that takes me from Loreto via Santa Ana (wrong direction) towards San Ignacio in about 45 minutes. 

In that sense she was speeding up a little her presentation but she did it really well. Only speaking Spanish with some English words we managed really fine with my Spanish and Jesuit knowledge at that stage. Most interesting for me was the motivation of the Guaraní to go into a Christian Mission. Without knowledge I would have thought that the Guaraní were forced into the Mission but she explained that their chief decided for his tribe to found a mission because often the tribes were menaced by the Portugese and without fired arms they were helpless to defend themselves. Therefore they asked the Spanish to found the Jesuit missions also the get access to weapons and defend themselves from the commun enemy. Also very interesting for me was that only 2 Spanish Jesuits were responsible for the couple of thousand Guaraní in the mission. I would have thought that it was like a mixed society.

All in all Loreto is really great to experience after visiting Trinidad in Paraguay as it´s totally different. The ruins were not freed from the nature and it looks really left as it was when first re-discovered. Only some stones are added afterwards or exchanged but then they are marked as not original. Also some wooden excarvation constructions save for example the original lavatory of the mission. Additionally in the middle of the forest with ruins there are a lot of Yerba Mate trees which was also one of the key resources of the Missions to export and interesting to see where all the tea comes from that I have also started drinking being in South America.

After paying the guide an unexpeted money and hurrying to the Loreto bus station and waiting another 20 minutes until the bus actually came at 04:20 p.m. (please check with the guides ahead of your visit when there is a public bus coming that will take you to the other WHS towns of Santa Ana and San Ignacio) I arrived at San Ignacio at about 5 p.m.. I made the tricky decision to eat something in the restaurant La Misionerita right at the highway which caused me to arrive at San Ignacion Miní (another 20 min walk away from the Ruta) only at about 6:30 p.m.. This was unfortunately the time when they closed the gates for public visit and they only re-opened at 8:15 p.m. for the 8:30 p.m. for the light show. Luckily in the meantime in the park next to the mission the samba club of the town had its public practice where the teenagers of town practiced their carnaval skills like playing the drums, singing and of course the swing of the hips. Being entertained for over an hour I went back the few metres to the mission San Ignacio Miní for the light show.

I liked the technique of the light show a lot, the story was a bit too much for me. All Spanish Dyslexics received headphones that worked really well for me with the English text in my ear instead of the public Sopanish loudspeakers in the dark. In the meantime a Guaraní chiefs´ face was projected on a tree telling the story of the Guaraní in the missions. Then a really thin layer of water was created in the dark forest where a story of a Guaraní boy was projected on. Really impressive technique but a bit too much of a Disney Story for me with not so many information. The same concept led me through the whole mission to the Plaza Mayor in the end telling the story of the mission and the boy. The ruins were also enlighted in a colourful way most of the time. After 40 minutes the show ended and I was able to stop a bus at the ruta that took me back to Posadas Terminal and at about 11:15 p.m. another public bus took me back to the Posadas hostel.

Having seen San Igancio Miní only in the enlighted dark it´s hard to get a full understanding, but I think San Ignacio Miní is cmparable to Trinidad in Paraguay. It´s quite big and well prepared for visiting with cut grass and nature free ruins. I liked the mixture of visiting Loreto with a guide for the information and San Ignacio Miní with the light show. However the visit of these three missions gave me enough of a picture of the Jesuit missions.