Santarem, Brazil

The water down here is so muddy, it's hard to believe that there are even any fish in it. In fact, there is so much silt, trees and logs floating in it, it is hard to believe that anything can survive in there. The water is so muddy that the ship can not even filter it to produce clean water. Everyone has been told to drink beer, shower with a buddy and not do laundry until we reach cleaner waters!

Santarem was our next port of call. When most people think about the Amazon, they don't think about traffic jams and construction delays. Instead they think about that National Geographic special they saw when they were a kid. Well, I'm here to tell you that times have changed. This little city, of about 250,000 people, is what a typical Amazonian city looks like today (and they do have traffic jams).

The downtown area is filled with stores selling everything that you would expect to find in Toronto. However, there were a couple of key differences. For instance, I never saw a big grocery store. I never saw a big department store. And for some strange reason, every second store seemed to be shoe store, every third store sold school supplies and every fourth store was a pharmacy. Apparently, everyone in the Amazon has an Imelda Marcos foot fetish, a severe need for note paper and a hankering for prescription medication!

After checking out the stores, I went over to visit the cathedral. It's bright blue color made it easy to spot from anywhere in town.

Then I went to the city lookout to see Santarem's premier tourist attraction – the meeting of the waters. From the hilltop, you can see where the milky brown waters of the Amazon meet, but do not mix, with the dark blue waters of the Tapajos river. These two rivers run side by side for miles without mixing!

Above you can see one of the many riverboats that take tourists to see this natural phenomenon up close.

In the Amazon, you can see a lot of beautiful things like colorful birds and these bird of paradise flowers. You can also see brilliant sunsets like this every evening.