Two thirds of the way down South America’s Atlantic coast lay Uruguay.  The wide brown waters of the Rio de la Plata, or river of silver, define Uruguay’s southern and western borders.

At its mouth, the river is nearly two hundred miles across.  Just inside this massive opening lays the English Banks, a dangerous area of shallows and underwater sand dunes stretching across nearly twenty miles of river way.

The English Banks has been a major obstacle to world navigation since European ships first started sailing here in the sixteenth century.

Today, more than a thousand shipwrecks are strewn within the confines of this relatively small geographic area.  Most are completely covered by the constantly churning sands.  Others have masts, towers and even hulls standing clearly above the shallow water.