Other Lake District Vessels

Rowing Boats

Traditional Lakeland rowing boats are relatively heavily built of wooden clinker construction. Instead of using rowlocks, the oars are usually mounted on pintles.

Rowing boats seem to have been very common on Ransome's "Lake in the North". Virtually everyone who had lake frontage had one, including the Jacksons, Dixons and Swainsons at their respective farms, as did Captain Flint living on his houseboat. Others were used by fishermen, often "towing a spinner for pike". There were many more hire boats "windmilling about" (The Picts and the Martyrs, Chapter 15) close to Rio and the other villages.

The Beckfoot rowing boat plays a more significant role than most. In Swallowdale, it becomes a war canoe, used for exploring up the Amazon River. In Winter Holiday it plays a vital role providing communications between Holly Howe and Beckfoot, especially when Dick and Dorothea have their first experience afloat.  

Steamers

The Lake Steamers are a constant background image in Swallows and Amazons and Swallowdale. In the former book their very size and role seems to be deliberately vague, in keeping with the way that the Swallows imagine the Lake as a vast unexplored ocean. It isn't really clear whether the lake steamers are primarily passenger vessels, or perhaps carrying cargo between settlements along the lake.

In practice, the steamers will have been based on those present on Windermere in the 1930s. Today there are three large "steamers" on the lake, the MVs Tern, Teal and Swan. Of these three only the Tern, built in 1891, would have been present in 1930, operating alongside the MV Cygnet and MV Swift. 

Tern was built for the Furness Railway Company at Wivenhoe and was delivered to the lake in pieces for final assembly. Tern is 140' long and was originally designed to carry up to 700 passengers.

Launches

A number of launches are mentioned in the Lake District books. Of these, only the Beckfoot Launch plays a significant role, most notably in Chapter 20 of Swallowdale. Here Ransome describes a motor launch with an open forepart equipped with seats, a cabin equipped with a dining table amidships, and an open well aft, used by the helmsman to steer the craft.

This layout echoes many traditional Windermere launches, which were often extremely fine craft. Early examples, such as the fleet maintained by the Windermere Steamboat Museum, were usually steam-powered and are virtually silent in operation. The Beckfoot launch evidently ran on petrol and was somewhat noisier. Whether she was built with a motor, or was converted from steam=power is not revealed.

Other Vessels

The Lake was clearly a busy place with larger sailing yachts and motor boats as well as the background vessels mentioned above. Of these the Polly Ann is mentioned by name: she was a large racing yacht moored "close by the Point" (Swallowdale, Chapter 32), whose position helped Nancy navigate Amazon through the fog.

Go to Captain Flint's Houseboat

Return to the Boats of Swallows and Amazons

Go to Teasel