Umiak and crew on the shores of Taserssuak Lake, Greenland
The Greenland umiak is a fairly large boat constructed on a light wooden framework covered with sealskin. It can hold up to about twenty persons, of whom the women-folk often had the duty of propelling it by the use of wooden paddles. As Greenland is almost treeless, wood is a very valuable material, and so, in the event of breakages, these implements would be repaired carefully with leather-bound splicing, rather than being replaced. In spite of this scarcity, the Greenlanders used branches from rowan bushes to decorate this particular boat, and to carry the Danish flag in the stern. In former times the umiak was often the nomadic Greenlander's only means of travelling from place to place.
