How to predict the weather with egg whites? With Saint Peter’s boat. 2022/06/23

Saint Peter’s boat, also known as Saint Peter’s sailboat is a very popular tradition very well extended throughout the north of Italy in the rural areas.

Saint Peter, fisherman and sailor of the souls, blew the sails of the boat and therefore indicated the weather: the farmers interpreted the open and large sails as the coming of beautiful sunny days. Instead, if the sails were closed and thin, there would be bad weather and obviously this would affect the harvest.

This ancient and suggestive ritual, is only celebrated on the night of June 28th to 29th, on the occasion of San Pedro and San Pablo festivities.

The procedure is very simple, you just need an egg and a large glass jar filled with water, preferably in a lengthy shape like a carafe or a jug.

At night, soon after sunset, place the jar over the grass under a tree or in the balcony of an external window and let the egg white drip into the water.

This way the fluid absorbs the dew of the first hours of the morning.

On the next day we will witness the magic: the egg white will form white stringy structures with transparent strokes similar to those of a boat’s sails. Observe your boat early in the morning because it tends to disappear.

But what really happens?

In reality, this phenomenon is due to the humidity and thermal oscillation between the night and day, typical of the first days of Summer (let’s remember it’s Summer Solstice and therefore the beginning of the season is on the 21st of June).

Are you intrigued?

Try to make Saint Peter’s boat and tell us how your sails look.