| The Rosyqueen Type: Caravel The Rosyqueen is a type of ship called a caravel, which means it has three masts, a square-rigged mainmast and a jib and also a smaller lateen-rigged mast in the rear, above the poop (raised deck at the stern). One of the common characteristics of a caravel is to have a narrow poop and a high forecastle (raised deck at the bow of a ship), which is where the crew's 'ave their bunks. She is made out of the finest cherry wood brushed with pine resin and therefore has a beautiful rose-colored hue, thus its name. The Rosyqueen is smaller than my favorite ship, Lone Seabird, but it's equally fast and maneuverable. The figurehead is of an tawny owl, wings outstretched over the water and its beak open in a hunting cry. The bowsprit extends some 7 feet over the owl figurehead. Engraved in bronze on the side near the bow is the word Rosyqueen, with an intricate carving of a rose entwined around it. Unlike the Lone Seabird, the Rosyqueen has a deep keel and therefore provides excellent balance in deep waters. This also means that she cannot dock in extremely shallow waters. The view from the crow's nest is simply superb, especially at dawn or dusk. The cabins are comfortable but rather small, and a full-grown male badger might have a little trouble moving easily about in his bunk. |
| The Lone Seabird Type: Barque Me ole Lone Seabird is a ship they calls the barque, the hull (main body of a ship) being made from strong mahogany and brushed over with a layer of pine resin to keep 'er watertight an' shiny. Now, this barque 'as three masts with the aftmost mast fore-and-aft rigged and all the others wif' square an' lateen sails. The mainmast is made of a tall supple willow that 'twill bend with the wind where other trees would snap. The flying jib, the foremost sail o' a ship that makes the ship fairly skim over the water, looks like an eagle's wing stretched out o'er the waves.. The crew's quarters 'ar in the forecastle, the raised deck in the front o' a ship. The cabins are cozy but not too big. The inside wall is painted with various designs. A window in each cabin provides a cozy view of the sea 'as the boat rocks up an' down on the waves.The bowsprit is about 10 or so feet long, and darin' beasts can climb atop of it to get a good look of the sea during calm weather, at the risk of being thrown into the sea because there, in front as well as atop the masts, the ship's momentum is greatest. If you climb all the way up the mainmast riggin,' you'll end up in a small viewing platform called the crow's nest, which is usually the highest part of a ship. Sailors on watch duty climb up there to watch for other ships, land and such. You must be careful up there in a storm because the pitching waves could throw you off into the water, or onto the deck of the ship (ouch!) She 'as a narrow poop (raised platform at the back of a ship) as do all barques. The figurehead is an eagle with wings spread o'er the water and mouth open as if crying out. Painted in gold on the side is an engraving of the words Lone Seabird in the archaic script and a tiny intricate picture of an eagle. The ole Seabird also 'as a flat bottom, which allows it to cruise along the coasts and dock just about anywhere. It comes with a small boat called a yawl, which is perfect if you want to go somewhere where the barque itself is too big to fit through or if you're escapin' from a storm. For protection against overly high waves, the Seabird 'as bulwarks that extend over the whole length of the upper decks. Because of her sleek streamlined shape (helped in part by the pine resin), the Lone Seabird 'as no trouble outrunnin' other ships when at full sail and with flying jib extended. All in all, the Lone Seabird is a quick and easily maneuverable prize ship which many beasts would highly value. |
| Rova's Fleet {please don't steal these ships, these descriptions are entirely original.} |
| The Kestrel Type: Ketch Easily the smallest and the best maneuverable of my ships, this little craft was built for speed rather than comfort. Indeed there isn't a craft in all the seas that has raced with my Kestrel and won. She is a ketch and therefore is a fore-and-aft rigged vessel but with a larger mizzen than a yawl and with the mizzenmast farther forward on the bow. Her hull is purest black, made with the timber from a fir tree. This improves the streamline and sleekness of the ketch, allowing it to practically skim over the water. To top it all off, the hull has been brushed over with many layers of pine resin making it superbly watertight and shiny. The Kestrel is far too small to have cabins, and instead a crewbeast must sleep on a hammock below deck (or on deck in good weather). The ship does not have much cargo space and so is inconvenient for long journeys. She can be used for pleasure, but more often she is attached to one of my larger ships should we need to make a quick getaway. Unusually, the Kestrel has two wooden rudders instead of one. The tiller controls both rudders, allowing the ship to turn with just a small movement and making the ship extremely easy to handle and steer. She has a built-in compass in the stem as extra measure, as any good seafarer should be able to tell where they are and what direction they are facing by simply looking at the position of the stars. Therefore this compass is perfect for bad weather and if you have to tell where you are in a tight spot. There is only one cabin on board, which is below deck, and it is never used as living quarters. It's home to many maps and charts of all the coasts, but it is hardly used anymore because once you have been a seafaring beast for a long time you learn to sail by instinct. The only place the mizzenmast rigging leads to is the crow's nest, which can be quite a sensation when you're practically flying at a terrific speed over the waters. Because being up there feels so much like flying like a bird, crewbeasts that have been aboard the Kestrel nickname the crow's nest the Eagle's Roost. Because the ketch is flat-bottomed, this allows the sleek Kestrel to go just about anywhere with ease. |
| The White Plover Type: Riverboat The White Plover is a fine ole riverboat, designed for the streams and rivers of Mossflower but not oceans. She was a gift from a tribe of bankvoles the north bank of the River Moss in return for rescuing their Chief from a band of plundering stoats. The Plover is made from the finest sugar maple and shines like a honey globule because of the many layers of melted pine resin applied to her sleek, shiny sides. To maintain a good appearance, I polish her when I have the spare time. She has a forked stern (like a bird) and pointed bow. She has no masts, because after all the good ole White Plover is a riverboat. Instead she has three pairs of pinewood oars about 6-7 feet long and relatively light. The ends of the oars are shaped like a plover's wings. The riverboat is an excellent racer and can easily outstrip the average logboat or riverboat. This is partly because she's so light a fit beast can carry her on his shoulders for a long time without getting tired. The Plover is not very wide but very long and skinny, making the White Plover perfect for fitting through tight places and for the sake of speed. I normally don't like lugging a boat around all the time, even if it's one as pretty and light as the White Plover, so I leave her with the Logalog of the Guosim Shrews when I don't feel like sailing. |
| The Flounder Type: Logboat Flounder is the name I gave the very first boat I crafted when I was only a young Kitt shipbuilding apprentice... She wasn't much more than a hollowed out log layered with strips of birchbark. Her single mast was a young sapling with white sheets as sails. I remember I scrawled the word Flounder (rather messily) on the side with a pointed stick. There isn't much left to tell about it. |
| The Kingfisher Type: Fishing smack The Kingfisher is my ole otter fishing smack, traditional of sea otters. She's simply the best fishing boat you can find, made out of fine beech wood and equipped with nets, maps, rods, and everything else you need to catch lots of fish. She is a fore-and-aft rigged smack with only one mast and a single jib. The hull is long, skinny, and light and not at all very tall. Like all my ships, she was brushed over with a double layer of melted pine resin making her (you guessed it) extremely watertight and shiny. The Kingfisher was painted with light blue dye and her square sails were dyed purple. She is a flat-bottomed craft with no keel to better get at the coastal fish that range up and down the shores. She's not very big, only about 50 or so feet long. She also has no bowsprit, forecastle, or poop. The Kingfisher has no cabins, as she was made for short fishing trips rather than long journeys. The best living quarters she can provide are simple but comfortable hammocks tied to the rigging. The Kingfisher, was made, not by me, but by a family of northland mice that my family is close friends with and expert shipbuilders like me. She was a gift for chasing off none other than Captain Tirrak's crew, heavily armed and looking for food. As you might know, most Corsairs and searats are highly superstitious and will tremble at the slightest mention of a ghost or so on. So I and my friends did an imitation of the Sea Bogle (giggle) and scared them before they could stumble on and discover the mice family's home in the caves. I wouldn't be lying when I say Tirrak's motley crew ran like the very devil from Dark Forest was chasing them during the dead of night. Any'ow, when the mice discovered that the crew they had been hiding from were gone, the father rewarded me and my friend with their prized beautiful fishing smack, the ole Kingfisher itself. My friend, (sorry to say), though she's a sea otter like me, doesn't care much for boats (very strange indeed for a sea otter) so she insisted on me keepin' the boat. |
| The Greengalley (formerly called the Bloodkeel) Type: Corsair galley The Greengalley was actually a ship I stole from some Cosairs a few seasons ago, Like most Corsair ships, the Bloodkeel (as the Corsairs called it) was a slave galley. This one had two levels of oardecks, both with poor starved slaves that were whipped and chained to the oars. The crew numbered about 20 in all, led by the sadistic fox Captain Tirrak who later became my life-long arch-nemesis. The crew was away on a foraging party, leaving three on board as watch. I crept aboard the ship, gagged and bound them and threw them overboard. I hadn't reckoned on the captain still being there! We fought for a short time and I ended up chopping off his big bushy tail (which all foxes treasure highly).I pushed him over the stern, into the shallows and sailed away on my new ship (it was, in fact, my first proper ship since I made the Flounder as a Kitt). Not very surprisingly, Tirrak swam to shore, gathered up his remaining seventeen crewbeasts, and has since then been gathering a horde to come after me and take his revenge someday. I was little more than a Kitt then, so I didn't know any better. Captain Tirrak's doubtlessly still out there somewhere, cursing me and the loss of his beloved ship. I freed the oarslaves and renamed the ship Greengalley, because the masts and sides were green with moss and barnacles. I kept the Greengalley for a while until I got tired of her and stashed her in a cave as a treasure hideout (I did stash some valuable treasures in it, so I'm not telling where it's hidden). |
| S.S. Resilience Type: Warship The S.S. Resilience is a sturdy ole warship, designed for fighting at sea. She is, in fact, a galleon, and the biggest and heaviest of all my ships. She is a heavily square-rigged ship with four masts and a fifth smaller mast at the bow, supporting a lateen-rigged jib. This makes the Resilience rather faster (if only by a little) than other large ships of her size. She's made of the strongest layers of sturdy oak and her sides are coated with a thin layer of steel, making her immune to arrows or fire arrows and highly resistant to floods. This is very convenient when seagoing vermin are trying to sink the Resilience by holing her with arrows and pikes. She also has a very long pointed bowsprit, which serves as a convenient ram for rippin apart an enemy ship's hull and threrfore sinking it. As I said, the bowsprit ram is very big, about twenny feet long and half a foot wide. Her sails are dyed sea blue, partly for good looks and mostly for camouflage(so it's hard to see the S.S. Resilience coming from a distance if she's the same color as the sea). The sails are made of the toughest leather and covered with a layer of thin bark. This makes them heavy and just a little inflexible, but it also means it's almost impossible for an archer to shoot holes in the sails. She has very few windows, and those that exist are very small and mainly used as arrow slits to fire at vermin. She has many stores of weapons below deck, so it's just about impossible to run out of arrows or slingstones or anything of that sort. She even has a small forge down below to sharpen weapons or make new ones. Because the galleon is so big, she can hold tons of food supplies and so can easily last out a battle for many days. One large cabin below deck is devoted wholly to many maps and charts of the seas, so should the Resilience need to make a quick getaway I know exactly where the best shortcuts and hiding places are. The S.S. Resilience is simply perfect for long voyages and journeys because of the massive amount of food, water, supplies and weapons she can hold in her hull because of her great size. As a plus, she is (as she is named) extremely resilient to an attack or invasion of any kind by searats or Corsairs. Her one downside is that because she's so big, it's difficult to find a place to dock her. |
| Lupine Type: Lateener The Lupine is what is called a lateener. Lateen-rigged means a triangular sail, so obviously a lateener like the Lupine has all lateen-rigged sails rather than square-rigged sails like some of my other ships. She is about 75 feet long and has two masts (both, as I have said many times, lateen-rigged). Her hull is made of the finest ash wood and painted over with (surprise!) a layer of melted pine resin. Her foremost mast has a slightly bigger sail than the mainmast, and she has no jib, flying jib, or figurehead. Her bowsprit isn't very long at all, very short compared to many ships (especially the S.S. Resilience with a 20-foot long doohickey). Indeed, if you weren't looking closely, from afar you would probably say she doesn't even have a bowsprit. Upward up the rigging halfway between the mainmast is a crow's nest, not very big or very high up. The highest point of the mast (what's called the top royal gallants on all ships) is far higher than the crow's nest. Still and all, it's a nice view especially if you don't want to climb all the way up the angled mast (since the Lupine is after all a lateener, both masts lean at an angle to support the triangular-shaped sails). A crow's nest can just about always provide a nice view (but not in a storm, obviously). Unusually, the Lupine has two crow's nests, the other one being at the halfway point up the foremost sail. On a horizontal line, the crow's nest on the foremast is slightly lower down than the mainmast crow's nest. The Lupine is a flat-bottomed boat, not big enough to have a deep keel like my warship S.S. Resilience. She provides relatively comfortable cabins, about 15 in all. She doesn't have a captain's cabin, like some other ships, but instead the captain must sleep in the same type of cabin as the rest of the crew. The cabins are all below deck, since the Lupine's forecastle and poop are too small to hold a whole set of cabins in them. She has two rudders to improve her speed, one on each side of the stern port and the starboard aft. She can go about 15 knots per hour (a knot is equal to 1.5 land miles), which is a proud top speed for almost any ship. However, I can't say she's among my fastest ships (which would be the Kestrel, and the Sunset Mage who's description is yet to come). Still, she's a fairly good sailer for her size. |
| The Sunset Mage Type: Clipper ship The Sunset Mage is among the fastest and most beautiful of any of my ships, or indeed any ship on the blue seas.Truly one of my most favorite ships. She is what's known as a clipper ship, which means if pushed at a good rate her top speed is 20 knots (as I have said before, a knot is equal to 1.5 land miles) per hour (slightly faster than even my Kestrel!) Her tremendous speed is very surprising for clipper ships are traditionally extremely large and with many masts. Okay, I lied when I said the S.S. Resilience is my largest ship (but she is still the heaviest and best armed)...The Sunset Mage boasts 230 feet and five masts: A foremast, mainmast, jib, stern jib, and a flying jib out in front. She also sports as many as 30 sails, pushing her along at a terrific speed whenever there's any wind at all. She has a slender and graceful hull, helping her speed even more. Actually her flying jib mast has not one but three lateen-rigged sails tied to the bowsprit, all on top of each other with a gap in between each one to let the wind through, making her skim easily thorugh the water like an eagle. In real life, a clipper ship can race from New York City around the tip of South America through the Strait of Magellan to San Francisco in less than 100 days. Clipper ships are agreed to be one of the most magnificent and romantic models of ships. Being so large and comfortable, the Sunset Mage provides many comfortable cabins. Her forecastle and poop are not very high, making the hull one continuous streamlined shape. At her stern, she carries many small lanterns that producing a soft glowing light at night. The lanterns are actually lit by myriads of tiny fireflies inside each one. It can be a bit of a long and frightening climb to the top royal gallants of the highest mast, the mainmast, but once you get there the view is quite simply breathtaking. I simply can't describe how it feels to be flying up there, especially during dusk when the whole scene is illumated with the warm colors of the setting sun mixed with the soft glow of the firefly lanterns at the stern...Just wow. Perfect for a dinner by candlelight. Clipper ships are the absolute necessity for long journeys because since the Sunset Mage can glide along at a breathtaking speed and her large hull, she can hold many supplies and get wherever you're going in an incredibly short time. Even though she is plenty big compared to most other ships, the Sunset Mage is one of the smallest of clipper ships but can can race with the best of 'em. She's my preferred ship to go anywhere in the open seas unless I want extra protection against pilfering Corsairs and searats...that's where the S.S. Resilience comes in. But usually the magnificent Sunset Mage is very sufficient for all my needs. |
| The Poppycock Type: Carrack The Poppycock is what's called a carrack, a fine sailing ship made from mahogany that is a combination of the best features of a cog (a single-masted ship with a square-rigged sail and high castles at both the bow and stern) and the lighter lateener. Carracks are usually three-masted, and the Poppycock is no different. She's about 100 feet (30 meters) long. Her mainmast, which sports a huge square-rigged sail, is very easily the tallest mast on board. The jib mast at the sterm is angled (as described on the Lupine) and is lateen-rigged and about half the height of the square-rigged mainmast. The foremast in front is also lateen-rigged and about a third the height of the mainmast. She has a very broad and long poop (for those of you who've forgotten, a poop is a raised deck at the stern of a ship, NOT the other kind) Therefore the crew's cabins are located in the stern rather than at the forecastle, as is usual with other ships. Her forecastle isn't especially big but is about average-sized. This is a kind of ship who's crow's nest is higher than the mainmast rather than about halfway up as is the case with my lateener, Lupine, mentioned above. The square-rigged sail of the mainmast is slightly curved outward, giving one absolutely no support against the rigging. Luckily the rigging is stretched fairly taut from the top royal gallants to the deck. Up there (surprise!) is the crow's nest with a red pennant snapping in the breeze. A very nice view indeed, but it can't compare with the high flying sensation of the Sunset Mage's crow's nest. She is rather a "beamy" carrack, which means she has riggings and beams all over the place ensuring that even in a storm everything will better stay intact. The mainmast sail is very large, as I have said, stretching from the deck all the way up to the high crow's nest, to better catch the wind. A pretty decent fairly fast ship, on the whole. |
| The Sunhawk Type: Birchbark Canoe The Sunhawk is a birchbark canoe, made of strips of birch bark as said and about 15 feet long. A common characteristic of birchbark canoes is that they are traditionally very long and light. The Sunhawk is no different. In real life, Native Americans used to carry them from river to river because they were so light, unlike dugout canoes which are large and heavy and therefore impossible to carry any long distance. She was painted over with (you guessed it) layers of melted pine resin, making her (you guessed it again) extremely streamlined and shiny. The Sunhawk was dyed golden in color, hence her name. This makes her appear very shiny and graceful indeed. Her bow is a replica of a hunting hawk, making her even more true to her name. Carved around her sleek sides is a message in ancient sea otter runes. The characters are rather oddly shaped, just a bunch of twisty lines to anyone that doesn't know the language. Ther are very few sea otters who have learned the tongue, and I have the honor of being among them. My mother taught me and her mother before her. I suppose they resemble Ancient Runes (you can see the complete alphabet in an encyclopedia) just a bit. The concept is the same. The message is somewhat like the badger runes in the very heart of Salamandastron, where badger Lords go to seek courage and so on. Prophetic, as you might say. I copied them from an ancient dusty ole barkcloth scroll I found in our Holt Library... Anyway, my point is that ancient otter runes completely encompass the top part of the hull. I must say it looks rather dashing, carved in gold. The ole Sunhawk is very fast vessel, but she was designed only for rivers and streams, not the rough oceans. I've never heard of a canoe that has. |
| The Timer of Camilia Type: Warship My captain is Swiftpaw Quickeye. The only captain I will sail under. I am the second mate. He built it with me, Xaiver and Tolt and a few other volunteers. We are still looking for our archenemy (Swiftpaw's mostly), Stave Blorn. |