Tall Ships Festival: 6 to 15 September

The Tall Ships Festival starts today with ships coming through the Heads and arriving in Williamstown tomorrow.
The Tall Ships came to Port Melbourne in 1988 for the Bicentenary Celebrations which were launched nationwide on New Year's Eve at Princes Pier by Prime Minister Bob Hawke. A quarter of a million people visited the Tall Ships over the week they were in Port.
The visit of the Tall Ships is an opportunity to revisit that exciting week in Port, and to get a sense of the foreshore before Beacon Cove.

Cranes on Station Pier, Tall Ship and pylon at the western end of Centenary Bridge 

viewed from the driveway of the Mission to Seamen building

One of the cranes is soon to be re-instated at the finger pier next to Station Pier

photo Alison Kelly PMHPS collection

The Mission to Seamen building,
demolished in 1995
photo Alison Kelly PMHPS Collection

Crowds flow across Centenary Bridge after viewing the Tall Ships
The Bridge was demolished in 1991
photo Alison Kelly PMHPS Collection