What is the difference between an ark and a wherry?

star_gazer

Both river boats, wherries were most often found on the River Thames, while arks where seen only in North America. A wherry (meaning "boat") is type of boat that was traditionally used for carrying cargo or passengers on rivers and canals in England, and is particularly associated with the River Thames. Passenger wherries evolved into the Thames skiff, a gentleman's rowing boat. Wherries were clinker-built with long overhanging bows so that patrons could step ashore dryshod before landing stages were built along the river. It is the long angled bow that distinguishes the wherry and skiff from the gig and cutter which have steeper bows following the rise of the Royal Navy, and the building of landing stages. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wherry An ark was a temporary boat used for river transport in eastern North America before canals and railroads made them obsolete. Arks were built primarily to carry cargo downriver on the spring freshet to carry lumber or logs and agricultural produce to a port city downriver. Upon arrival, the cargo was sold, the ark was dismantled and its lumber was also sold, and the ark pilots returned home on foot or horseback. Despite the slowness of the craft, it was stable and with a skilled crew was capable of maneuvering through fairly narrow points. Other river craft, usually the batteau or bateau worked alongside the arks, ferrying the workers while the horses and bunks and supplies floated down the larger, stable structures. Some arks in the Susquehanna River system were up to 75 feet long. The arks within the Greenbrier River in West Virginia averaged sixty feet save for the larger cooking arks used to feed loggers four times a day. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ark_(river_boat) Dec 05 10, 7:19 PM