Photo: Southern shoreline of the Saint Lawrence River, photo courtesy of Shevawn Innes

Date: Thursday, June 27, 2019
Time: 1100 hours EDT
Position: 20 nautical miles east of Toronto, middle of Western Lake Ontario
Sails: foresail, staysail, square-fore-topsail
Conditions: light westerly wind of 5 knots. Lake waters calm
Heading: northwesterly
Speed: 2 knots

The travel of Pride of Baltimore II up the last three-quarters of the St Lawrence River was a steady motor-boat trip. Of the past six days since last Friday, all of it has been spent motoring except for time spent at anchor a bit upriver of Quebec City for 10 hours Saturday (while waiting for a second flood cycle); then at anchor for 10 hours Sunday night in Montreal (waiting to have seaway inspection next morning); and 22 hours moored in Clayton, New York, at the town dock from Tuesday midday to Wednesday morning. All without any sailing. Of course, no sailing in the narrow confines of the river, but also not in Lake Ontario because the wind was either contrary or hardly at all. Now that Pride/em> is a mere 20 miles from Toronto with tomorrow the time to actually show up for the entry parade of sail, we are able to enjoy the quiet and peaceful sail that started only a couple of hours ago.