The St. Lawrence River fractures into 1,864 islands between Kingston and Brockville, a granite archipelago that marks the geological boundary where the Canadian Shield meets the Adirondack Plateau. Steamboat service began here in 1838, when the Sir Robert Peel carried passengers between Kingston's limestone wharves and the summer estates rising on Wellesley, Wolfe, and Howe islands. By 1875, the route had become North America's most fashionable inland cruise, drawing industrialists who built castellated mansions on private islands and transformed the archipelago into a freshwater Newport. Today, the 1000 islands cruise Kingston industry operates from the same Brock Street waterfront that launched those early steamers, offering modern vessels that navigate the international shipping channel and weave through the island clusters where herons nest in white pine and property lines still follow the 1817 Rush-Bagot Treaty border. The Heart of the Islands route covers thirty-seven kilometres, passing beneath the Thousand Islands Bridge and circling close enough to shorelines that passengers can distinguish the boathouses, gazebos, and private docks that characterize the archipelago's cottage architecture. Longer itineraries add Boldt Castle on Heart Island, the six-storey Rhineland-style pile that hotel magnate George Boldt abandoned in 1904 and that now anchors the region's tourism narrative. The riverboat cruises depart hourly during high season, while lunch and dinner sailings offer plated service and slower pacing designed to align the meal course with sunset timing over the Canadian islands. Narration identifies individual islands by name and recounts the bootlegging history that flourished here during Prohibition, when the international border made the archipelago a smuggling corridor. The vessels themselves range from triple-deck touring boats with open upper observation decks to enclosed dinner cruisers with picture windows that frame the panorama without wind exposure. October sailings capture the hardwood foliage that ignites the north-shore slopes in crimson and saffron, a colour intensity that rivals the Laurentians and draws photographers who time their bookings to the leaf-turn predictions issued each September.