Traditional Greek Vessels

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Traditional Greek Vessels
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• Lets have a look at these vessels that have been
  the backbone of Greek trade for hundreds of years.

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Trehantiri

• Sometimes described as a donkey of the sea,
  trehantiris are slow but good in heavy weather.
  It is better to get where youre going rather
  than rush and not get there at all!

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• Trehantiris are still used for fishing in the
  Aegean, and are renowned as being very good sea
  boats, capable of taking whatever Neptune has to
  throw at them. In the days of sail some were as
  much as 40 metres long and weighed up to 250
  metric tonnes! They were used for carrying cargo
  around the countrys coasts and islands.

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• Many were rigged with a lateen sail though into
  the 20th Century a number carried schooner or
  lugger rigs. These newer rigging systems allowed
  faster sailing at all points of sail, though the
  lateen is good in downwind sailing and on a reach.

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• You may be lucky enough to go on a sailing trip
  aboard a trehantiri, as many of these vessels
  have been used for island hopping around the
  country.Trehantiris resembled other Mediterranean
  vessels, and in other countries were also called
  trabacoulo, for example, in Dalmatia in what is
  now Croatia. 

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Kaiki

• Another important Greek vessel is the kaiki,
  which ply all over Greek waters. Indeed, you will
  even see these on the Bosporus straits leading
  into the Black Sea. They are very similar to the
  Turkish kayiks, whose name has been borrowed by
  canoeists who today use the similarly named
  kayaks

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• Kaikis are lighter and smaller than the
  trehantiris, and are predominantly used as
  fishing boats, though again many fishermen take
  people on cruises aboard them in the summer. One
  of the things that really stands out about them
  is their ornate bowsprits, with figureheads among
  the most beautiful of any traditional vessels
  afloat today.

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• Though traditionally built of pine, the design of
  the kaiki has moved with the times and most are
  now built of glass fibre and composites. These
  are sturdy and almost unsinkable, as with the
  northern European dories in use in that part of
  the world.
• Turkish kayiks have a very similar aim to their
  modern descendant, the kayak. These are long,
  narrow and shallow rowing boats designed to take
  passengers.

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Karavoskaros, the bastardos of the sea?!

• The karavoskaro was built as a deep sea trading
  vessel, and some have been as big as 500 tonnes
  displacement, with a length in excess of 50
  metres. Originally built in a similar way to the
  trehantiri, the design was quickly found to be
  good even on very large vessels, and many plied
  the seas as trading vessels and even as warships
  in the age of sail.

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• A number of these great ships had square rigging
  and up to 3 masts, configured as brigs, barques
  and fully rigged ships. As the design changed,
  with elements of other Greek vessel design
  brought in including the trehantiri, so old salts
  in the region sometimes named them as
  bastardos, because they were offspring of
  unrelated parentage in design terms.

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• Just because a vessel has a dodgy parentage
  doesnt mean to say they are ugly! If you visit
  the annual Greek Traditional Boat Show then you
  will see some karavaskaros of great beauty and
  lineage!
• From these three vessels, Greece has become a
  great maritime nation with interests all over the
  world. You could be in Madagascar, Singapore or
  Los Angeles and find a Greek merchant ship coming
  into port one day. If you do, it is because these
  sturdy, fine craft enabled Greece to have such a
  fine maritime tradition!

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