The Río de la Plata, which is often translated into the River Plate by English speakers, actually means the 'River of Sliver' in Spanish.' I would think that it is more to do with mining than the river itself - you will see what I mean.

Around the time the time this estuary was discovered and I am not starting that debating point again here ( I had 200 emails from my historical accounts on this website ) it was first called Mar Dulce or sweet sea

Many of us remember the Battle of the River Plate (go the Kiwis), but few make the connection with this humongous stretch of water where both the Uruguay and Parana Rivers meet the sea. Puritans' will still argue that the Rio Del lat Plata is no river at all and so Argentina's claim to have one of the widest rivers in the world is incorrect. Where the Rio del la Plata meets the Parana and Uruguay confluence it is 48 kilometers wide (30 miles) and that extends to 220 kilometers or 180 miles where estuary water meets the Atlantic Ocean (damn I mentioned the estuary word again).

The river forms the border between Argentina and Uruguay and is home to Montevideo on the north bank and Buenos Aires on the south bank.

The Río de la Plata Basin or Cuenca del Plata in Spanish is the name given to the 3,100,000 square meters of land patterned by 19 major rivers and their many tributaries that covers Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay.

An estimated 57 million cubic meters (2 billion cubic feet) of silt is dumped by these waterways into the Rio de la Plata each year. This important shipping route is kept open by constant dredging and gives this water the unfortunate dirty brown colour, it is not pretty.