Santarém is a city in the state of Pará with a population of about 200,000. The river Tapajós joins the Amazon River here and it is a popular location for tourism. It was once home to the Tapajós Indians, a tribe of Native Americans after which the river was named. This tribe oversaw a large, agricultural chiefdom that flourished before the arrival of Europeans.
Santarém is also the name of the original city in Portugal, that gave the name Santarém to this Brazilian city. The city is the home to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Santarém.
Santarém-Maestro Wilson Fonseca Airport is an important alternative and supporting airfield in the Amazon region. It has regular connections to cities in Brazil.
It is also is an important regional market centre in Lower Amazonia located midway between the larger cities of Belém and Manaus. The economy is based on agriculture, cattle and mining.
The city has seen many 'cycles' of development dominated by one or a few economic activities, including (in the last century) rubber tapping, coffee production and gold mining. Most recently, there has been a huge growth in the area of soy plantations.
Many 'Mocorongos' seek to create a new Brazilian state by dividing the enormous state of Pará into western and eastern regions. The new state (the western part) would be called Tapajós, with Santarém serving as the capital.
Both the Amazon and the Tapajós rivers run along many miles in the front of the city, side by side, without mixing. The Amazon's milky coloured water carries sediment from the Andes in the East, while the Tapajós's water is somewhat warmer and has a deep-blue tone. This phenomenon is called "The meeting of the waters" by the locals as seen in the photo below. 
Tapajos River at Santarem is a clear water river, which means it has a neutral pH. The Amazon is a white water river, which means it is alkaline. Black water rivers are acidic. When the rivers of different pH values come together, they do not mix immediately, but flow side by side for a while. This of course happens a few times on the Amazon River.
Another popular place for tourism is the village of Alter do Chão, which is located by the Tapajós river, about 20 miles from Santarém. It can be reached by car (about half an hour) or by boat (one or more hours, depending on the boat).
There was no doubt it was going to be another very hot day. The sky was clear and the sun was already high in the sky when I appeared on deck. Both sides of the river were very green and I would say that the river was a few miles wide here.
In the distance hills were visible although generally the rain forest is flat as far as the eye can see. These particular highlands must be an exception to the landscape.
Every now and again a house would appear on the bank and one would assume that members of the indigenous population lived in them.
After awhile we spotted a largish village in the distance. 
It would be interesting to know what type of people lived here and what they did for a living.
The villagers' homes were built on a mound no doubt to protect against the seasonal flooding of the river.
Shown here is part of the Amazon map that illustrates where we came from overnight and where we are heading to this morning – Macapa to Santerem.
The river width varies considerably as there are many islands on both sides that do get confused with the mainland river banks. It is therefore difficult to sometimes gage how wide the river actually is at any given time.
When I returned from my breakfast and early morning photo shooting expedition, I was pleased to see Maria sunning herself in the early morning sun on the balcony. She informed me that she had been up since 7.30. I served her breakfast there instead of in bed as I usually did.
I soon joined her there while the sun was not yet at its fiercest. Rather than tempt pro-vidence I didn't stay in the sun too long although I was well covered with a high factor sun protector.
Little habitation was seen on the port side bank but occasion-ally there was sight of an isolated home. In this instance there was a road with a small building along side at the river's edge.
Traffic on the river was also nearly non-existent with just one little local boat spotted going in the opposite direction. Earlier a freighter had passed us going down river.
Shortly before 10 o'clock, our expected arrival time at Santarem, the Captain came on the PA system to informs us that we were running about one and a half hours behind schedule. It would appear that we had been heading into an unexpected 4 knot current that had slowed us down overnight. As a result our stay here would be extended until 7.00 pm.
The delay in reaching our next port of call meant that the Lido was extremely busy as passengers decided that they now had time to eat their lunch before going on on a coach/boat tour or whatever they had arranged. It was in fact slightly chaotic there until the ship eventually docked at near noon.
Approa-ching Santarem we had seen mile upon mile of the different coloured waters of the two rivers flowing side by side.
This was the famous confluence of the aquamarine Rio Tapajos and the muddy brownish Amazon. 
It is one of the “marriages of waters” found in the Amazon region, or as the locals call it “Enco-ntro das Aguas”.
Although quite an impressive phenomenon, the one we will witness at Manaus in a few days time is even more impressive we are told.
It was interesting seeing the devel-opment of the two rivers as they eventually started to merge and the colour blend into the murky silty brown of the Amazon.
For some distance before joining the distinctive stripes from the two rivers flow side by side until they eventually blend.
Our port today is almost equidistant between Manaus and Belem, and although Santarem is the Amazon's third largest city it is tiny in comparison with the other two.
It has over the years become one of the regions most important trading centres because of its geographical position with much of its commerce being transported by boat along this busy waterway.
There seemed to be many boats tied-up on the quay while we were here. It was noticeable that most of the boats that are used for transporting people have hammocks galore on their upper decks. It would appear that in this climate this is one way to manage a good night's sleep.
In the market place we passed stall after stall selling all kinds of hammocks in brightly coloured fabrics.
There must have been a very strong demand for them from the local population as they are not something your average tourist would be buying.
In the towns main shopping street we came across shop after shop selling shoes.
It tempted me to take a photo of two of the shop assistants in one of the shops.
We found it very hot and slightly uncomfortable as we walked through the town centre.
There was nothing much there for tourists the shops were mostly selling goods for the local population.
In the small town square lies the cathedral. It was very colourful on the outside, painted in a light blue.
This colonial building was consecrated in 1760's and is called Our Lady of Conceicao Cathedral.
The inside was pleasantly simple in layout and design and had the Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament on display.
In many ways it's a shame that when bus loads of tourists from a cruise ship arrive, as happened while we were there with people from our ship, the place just becomes a museum with often little respect for the what it represents. Indeed there is one individual from the ship who refuses to take his hat off in the church despite being asked to do us by another passenger. This had happen before in another church with the same individual involved.
After our visit to the Cathedral we walked along the river front in order to take advantage of the cooling breeze. There was a fair amount of local boat traffic on the river.
We passed one fishing boat filling up with ice presumably to preserve the fish that would later be caught by its nets. Two young men were keeping cool here by playing around in the waters by the boat.
This did suggest that the waters were not too polluted although I for one would not go for a swim in this part of town.
Maria and I had spotted an air conditioned restaurant near where the shuttle bus had dropped us off so thought this would be a good place to have a much need ice cold beer.
As we approached the estab-lishment there peering through the window, with large bottle of refreshing beer in hand, was Gerry who we hadn't realised was in town.
We soon then joined Gerry and Gary at their table and enjoyed a very large bottle of nicely chilled beer.
We had eaten a light lunch on the ship earlier so were not particularly hungry.
However, it would appear that Gary and Gerry had over ordered lunch so we were persuaded to help out.
After this it was back to the ship on the old shuttle bus. The only a/c here was the open windows that did help cool things down a little bit.
Today was, as expected, far too hot and the ship was a welcome retreat from the fierce local weather conditions.
The Lido restaurant, as usual, had its wide selection of its most welcome ice cream available when we returned.
At 7.00 pm the ship eventually set sail from the City of Santarem and slowly headed up river towards tomorrow's anchorage, Boca da Valeria.
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