The Benjamim Guimarães is a steam paddle boat

Paddle steamer

A paddle steamer is a steamship or riverboat, powered by a steam engine, using paddle wheels to propel it through the water. In antiquity, Paddle wheelers followed the development of poles, oars and sails, where the first uses were wheelers driven by animals or humans...

 based in Pirapora

Pirapora

Pirapora is a municipality in northcentral Minas Gerais in Brazil. Its population in 2007 was 51,636 in a total area of 577 km². The name Pirapora comes from the Tupi words for "fish" + "jump", referring to the piracema season when a mass migration of fishes ascends the São Francisco River...

, Minas Gerais

Minas Gerais

Minas Gerais is one of the 26 states of Brazil, of which it is the second most populous, the third richest, and the fourth largest in area. Minas Gerais is the Brazilian state with the largest number of Presidents of Brazil, the current one, Dilma Rousseff, being one of them. The capital is the...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

.

It was built at Pittsburgh in the United States by James Rees and Company in 1913, one of a number of similar steamboats built for South American service. It originally navigated the rivers of the Amazon basin

Amazon Basin

The Amazon Basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries that drains an area of about , or roughly 40 percent of South America. The basin is located in the countries of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, and Venezuela...

. In the 1920s the Benjamim Guimarães moved to the port of Pirapora on the Sao Francisco River.

Today, the Benjamim Guimarães is the only functioning steam paddle boat in all of Brazil. It is a tourist attraction and makes routine public trips on the São Francisco River

São Francisco River

The São Francisco is a river in Brazil. With a length of , it is the longest river that runs entirely in Brazilian territory, and the fourth longest in South America and overall in Brazil...

 from Pirapora downstream to the beginning of the Das Velhas River

Das Velhas River

The das Velhas River, of which the source was found to be the waterfall Andorinhas located in the municipality of Ouro Preto, is by length the major tributary of the basin of the São Francisco river...

.