If you're headed to South America to see wildlife, you must go to the Pantanal. This is an unparallelled bio-genetic reservoir of spectacular beauty, an ecological paradise with hundreds of species of animals and birds, thousands of varieties of butterflies, myriads of brightly-colored flowers, and shoals of fish.

The Amazon may have all the fame and glory, but the Pantanal is a far better place to see wildlife. This vast area of wetlands, about half the size of France (200,000 km2 during the rainseason), lies in the far west of Brazil and extends into the border regions of Bolivia and Paraguay.

The Pantanal is arguably the largest wetland on the globe. It is a huge wilderness region of swamps and marshes - wetlands created by the seasonal flooding of the river Paraguai and its many tributaries. Though it extends into the border areas of Bolivia and Paraguay, the bulk of the area is in the Brazilian states of Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul.

The rivers rise in the rainy season, October to March, flooding the Pantanal area. In the dry season, April to late September, the land dries out, leaving only a few waterholes and rivers where a fantastic array of wildlife gather to get a drink out of the rivers.

The Pantanal appeals any time of year to come to see animals like rhea, river otters, iguanas, anacondas, cougars, tapirs, crocodiles called caimans, deer, anteaters, dourado, jau and piranha fish, howler monkeys, capybaras (large rodents) and jaguar and birds such as the hyacinth blue macaw, jabiru woodstork and toucans that help create an aquatic and sylvan theatre of sights and sounds.