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A throng of tall ships
In 2010, schooners from around the world will converge on Great Lakes ports.
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The German brig Roald Amundsen will visit the Great Lakes in 2010.
If the flapping of giant sails makes your heart flutter, this is your summer to be on the Great Lakes.
The Denis Sullivan of Milwaukee’s Discovery Center is leading an armada of international schooners, barks and sloops on a race through the Great Lakes, from Toronto on Lake Ontario to Cleveland on Lake Erie, Bay City on Lake Huron, Chicago and Green Bay on Lake Michigan and Duluth on Lake Superior.
The Great Lakes United Tall Ships Challenge 2010
will promote freshwater conservation and youth sail training along the way. But the crowds gathered in ports along the way
mostly will want to see the spectacle of hundreds of sails flapping over historic vessels rarely seen on the Great Lakes.
They include the Amistad, a 129-foot replica of the schooner on which kidnapped Africans launched a revolt in 1839 that later became the basis for the Spielberg movie; the Europa, an 185-foot Dutch bark that was built in 1911 by the city of Hamburg, Germany, as a floating lighthouse on the Elbe River; and the 165-foot German brig Roald Amundsen, which once served the East German Army and sports 18 sails.
Eighteen tall ships will sail into Chicago, 12 into Green Bay and eight into Duluth. A flock of privately owned schooners will follow them, drawn like moths to flame.
Here’s a tip: Reserve your hotel rooms now. Or, sleep on the ships.
Youths are invited as apprentice crew members on many of the vessels, and the Denis Sullivan is offering berths for adults and family between Houghton and Duluth ($400) and Sault Ste. Marie and Green Bay ($600).
High-school students are invited on the stretch from Duluth to the Soo Locks ($1,000), and young women from Milwaukee to Chicago.
Each of the port cities is planning a festival, with tours and day sails for the public. From Toronto, the ships will sail to
Cleveland and arrive in the Lake Huron town of Bay City, Mich, for its Tall Ships
Celebration July 15-18. Nine ships will visit, and Bay City's own Appledore VI and Appledore V will give sailing tours.
Tickets go on sale May 1.
From there, eight ships will sail through the Soo Locks to Duluth for its Tall
Ships Duluth festival July 28-Aug. 3. Tickets go on
sale April 16.
Green Bay is holding its Tall Ship Festival Aug. 13-15, with 12 visiting ships.
Tickets go on sale May 10.
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In 2010, the Pride of Baltimore II will appear at all six ports in the Great Lakes Challenge and also at the Maritime Heritage Festival in Port Washington, Mich.
The final port is Navy Pier for Tall Ships Chicago, Aug. 24-29.
Sixteen ships will visit, plus Chicago's own Red Witch
and Windy will be among six ships giving sailing tours. Sailing tickets go on sale May
3.
Duluth, which was overwhelmed by the crowds that greeted three tall ships for its Maritime Festival in 2008, is preparing for an enthusiastic response to eight ships.
"We're so far inland that we don't see these boats very often,'' says Gene Shaw of Visit Duluth. "People get excited even when the ore boats come in.''
Multi-day on-board ship tour passes are $15, $12 for children 5-10. Multi-day dockside viewing passes are $12 and $6. Single-day dockside viewing passes will be sold at the gate, $6 and $4.
Passes include access to entertainment, including a pirate school of kids and performances of the Gilbert & Sullivan
operetta "Pirates of Penzance,'' July 29-Aug. 1.
Sailings on the Denis Sullivan and the schooner Roseway, built in Massachusetts in
1925, also will be sold, $52.50.
The Roald Amundsen, Amistad and Europa also will visit Duluth, along with the HMS
Bounty, which was built in 1960 for the movie "Mutiny on the Bounty'' and used in "Pirates of the Caribbean — Dead
Man's Chest.''
Two of the 2008 visitors will return, the 198-foot U.S. Brig Niagara of Erie, Pa., and the 157-foot Pride of Baltimore II, replicas of War of 1812 battleships.
Other ships taking part in the Great Lakes Challenge include the privateer Lynx, a replica of a Maryland schooner that fought on America's behalf in the War of 1812, and the Unicorn, which was built in the Netherlands in 1947 from German U-boat scrap metal and sails with an all-female crew.
Great Lakes vessels will join them, such as the Appledore IV, based in Bay City, Mich.; and the Friends Good Will, a replica of an 1810 square-topsail sloop based in South Haven, Mich.
Each city will welcome different ships, and sailing schedules will remain somewhat fluid until the last minute, since captains
have final say over each vessel's course. Watch web sites for details.
For more on other maritime festivals and tours of tall ships in the western Great Lakes, see Following the tall ships.
If you want to plan a Circle Tour that includes one of the festivals, see Circling Superior and Navigating Lake Michigan.
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