While heading south through Colvos Passage on July 3rd, we heard on the radio that Quartermaster Harbor was closed to all boats until 6pm that day due to the Tall Ship Parade of Sail. We arrived in the area just as the last one, the CGC Eagle, was leaving Quartermaster Harbor. An impressive number of pleasure craft surrounded the parade, and an equally impressive security contingent guarded the boats. The Eagle had a particularly large entourage: two 110-foot patrol boats, the Sea Lion and the Orcas, and two large tractor tugs, the Henry Foss and the Wedell Foss. A myriad of other small Coast Guard and Coast Guard Auxiliary craft in everything ranging from Coast Guard 27-foot utility boats to 50-foot pleasure-craft to jet skis zoomed throughout the crowds and the parading ships, while the Coast Guard’s 175-foot buoy tender Henry Blake stood off the entrance to Quartermaster Harbor.
We idled off the Ruston shore to watch the ships pass, then joined the crowds in the Foss Waterway as the ships docked and fighter planes swooped overhead.