Where Waters Meet: 12 Images of River Confluences Around the World

Where two rivers meet, the water often seems to have a seam. One side runs pale and silty, the other dark, green or clear, and for kilometres the two flow side by side before they finally blend. These twelve images, from Alaska to India, show some of the most striking meetings of waters on Earth and the stories behind them.

Why rivers of different colours flow side by side

A river carries the landscape it has crossed. Glacial and mountain rivers are loaded with fine sediment and rock flour, which turns them milky, brown or turquoise. Rivers that drain forests and swamps carry dissolved plant matter that stains them the colour of tea or coffee. When two such rivers meet, differences in temperature, speed and density keep them apart for a while, until turbulence finally mixes them.

The first image shows a related effect at sea. In the Gulf of Alaska, rivers fed by glaciers pour sediment-laden fresh water into the ocean, and the pale plumes swirl against the darker, clearer seawater along the coast.

River confluences in North America

Thompson and Fraser rivers, Lytton, British Columbia

At Lytton, the Thompson River flows southwest into the Fraser. The Nlaka’pamux people, who lived here long before the town, call the place Camchin or Kumsheen, “river meeting”. Lytton made headlines in 2021: on 29 June it recorded 49.6°C, the highest temperature ever measured in Canada, and the next day a wildfire destroyed most of the village.

Green and Colorado rivers, Canyonlands, Utah

Deep in the red rock of Canyonlands National Park, established in 1964, the Green River joins the Colorado. The two canyons divide the park into its three districts: Island in the Sky, the Needles and the Maze.

Ohio and Mississippi rivers, Cairo, Illinois

Two of North America’s largest rivers by discharge meet at Cairo, the southernmost city in Illinois and the lowest point in the state, at 96 metres above sea level and ringed by levees. In January 1862 Union general Ulysses S. Grant occupied the city and built Fort Defiance to guard the confluence. Cairo’s population peaked at 15,203 in 1920 and had fallen to 1,733 by 2020.

The Meeting of Waters near Manaus, Brazil

The most famous confluence of all lies just below Manaus, where the black Rio Negro meets the sandy-coloured Solimões, as the upper Amazon is called in Brazil. According to the European Space Agency, the Rio Negro gets its coffee colour from decomposing plant matter, while the Solimões carries sediment eroded from the Andes.

The waters run side by side without mixing for about 6 kilometres. The Rio Negro is warmer, at about 28°C against 22°C, and slower, flowing at nearly 2 km/h while the Solimões moves at 4 to 6 km/h. The Encontro das Águas is one of the main attractions for visitors to Manaus. The two images below show the same meeting, from water level and from the air.

River confluences in Europe

Moselle and Rhine, Koblenz, Germany

The Deutsches Eck, the “German Corner”, is a promontory where the Moselle flows into the Rhine. Its name comes from a commandery of the Teutonic Order. A 14-metre equestrian statue of Emperor William I stood here from 1897 until it was destroyed after the Second World War; a replica returned to the plinth in 1993.

Drava and Danube, near Osijek, Croatia

Just northwest of the Drava–Danube confluence lies Kopački Rit, a 177-square-kilometre floodplain wetland protected as a nature park since 1976 and listed under the Ramsar Convention in 1993. About 260 bird species breed here, including white-tailed eagles and black storks. The river system is part of what WWF calls the Amazon of Europe.

Ilz, Danube and Inn, Passau, Germany

Passau is the Dreiflüssestadt, the City of Three Rivers: the Inn joins the Danube from the south and the Ilz from the north. The image here is a painting. Its location comes at a price, and on 2 June 2013 the old town suffered severe flooding; flood peaks dating back to 1501 are marked on the wall of the Old City Hall. St Stephen’s Cathedral holds a famous organ with 17,774 pipes.

Rhône and Arve, Geneva, Switzerland

At La Jonction in Geneva, the blue Rhône, fresh out of Lake Geneva, meets the grey-green Arve. The Arve rises at the Col des Montets near Chamonix and is fed by the glaciers of the Mont Blanc massif, especially the Mer de Glace. Its heavy load of silt makes the contrast one of the sharpest in Europe.

River confluences in Asia

Alaknanda and Bhagirathi, Devprayag, India

At Devprayag, a sacred town at about 830 metres in Uttarakhand’s Tehri Garhwal district, the Alaknanda and the Bhagirathi meet and become the Ganges. It is the last of the Panch Prayag, the five holy confluences of the Alaknanda, and the stone Raghunathji temple stands above the town.

Jialing and Yangtze, Chongqing, China

Chongqing is built on hills partly surrounded by the Yangtze and the Jialing, which meet beside the Raffles City towers. The municipality had more than 32 million residents in the 2020 census. Downstream, the Yangtze cuts through the Three Gorges: Qutang, Wuxia and Xiling.

For more extraordinary rivers, explore Costa Rica’s Río Celeste and the green river-surface feature.

Related reading

• Caño Cristales: Colombia’s River of Colour and Its Living Plants

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