LOS ANGELES, August 6 (Itar-Tass) —— The Russian sailing ship Pallada, owned by the Far Eastern State Technical Fishing University, anchored at Canada’s Port of Victoria on Friday.
On July 1, the ship set out on an expedition dedicated to the 270th anniversary of the discovery of Russian America by Russian sailors and to the 50th anniversary of Yury Gagarin’s first space flight. The Pallada has already called at Alaska’s posts of Kadiak and Sitka and now has reached a third port on its route along North American lands that Russian seafarers discovered and developed in the middle of the 17th century.
Victoria is the capital city of British Columbia, Canada and is located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada’s Pacific coast. The city has a population of about 345,000 and since May 25, 1990 it has been a sister city of Russia’s Far Eastern Khabarovsk.
The mooring was complicated by a stormy weather, a source in the ship told Itar-Tass.
The local authorities say they will accord a hearty welcome. The Pallada’s crew and cadets will visit a number of museums in the city, and meet with members of the Victoria-Khabarovsk friendship association, the Whitehall Spirit sailing club, and other professional associations of sailors.
The Pallada will leave Victoria on August 7 or 8 to further head for the ports of San Francisco and Los Angeles, and then for Honolulu, on the Hawaiian Islands, and for Japan.
The Pallada sailing ship, built in 1989 in Poland’s Gdansk, is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the fastest sailing ship. It can reach a speed of more than 18 knots. Now the ship is used to train cadets and to take part in international regattas and festivals. Over the twenty years of its history, the sailing ship has made 109 voyages, called at 101 ports in 35 countries and trained more than 12,000 cadets from all over Russia.