Jodensavanne

By car we drive from Paramaribo along the highway towards the indigenous village of Powakka (where you get a guided tour), and continue to the Ayo plantation, where we take the ferry across to Jodensavanne.
There we have lunch and the guide gives a detailed explanation of Jodensavanne.
You can also take a dip in the Suriname River and use the healing spring.
If the school in the indigenous village of Powakka is open, we will visit it as well.

In the 17th century Jodensavanne was the largest Jewish settlement in this hemisphere, and its synagogue, of which a ruin remains, was the first of architectural significance in the Americas and one of the oldest in the Western Hemisphere.

Jodensavanne was the first, and at the time the only, place in the New World where Jews were offered (semi-)autonomy.
Jews fleeing the Spanish Inquisition were welcomed in Suriname, first by the English and later by the Dutch colonists, to settle and establish plantations along the banks of the Suriname River.
To attract Jewish colonists, the colonial government of the time granted the Jews special privileges, including freedom of religion, freedom of property and the right to their own court and jurisdiction.

Today the ruins and cemeteries can still be visited, and the story is illustrated with authentic photos and images.
The guide brings the history to life with stories while you take in the sights, so you get a good picture of what life was like back then: for the Jewish plantation owners, for their slaves and for the freed slaves.

A unique piece of Surinamese history.