Topsail schooner · France
Belle Poule
A French Navy training schooner of 1932. Her crew still sleep in hammocks.
Technical data
- Rig
- Topsail schooner
- Flag
- France
- Home port
- Brest
- Built
- 1932
- Shipyard
- Chantier Naval de Normandie, Fécamp, FRA
- Hull material
- Wood
- Length
- 37.5 m
- Beam
- 7.2 m
- Sail area
- 718 m²
- Sailing area
- French coast
Belle Poule and her sister ship Étoile are training ships of the French Navy based at Lanvéoc-Poulmic near Brest. Their wooden hulls were modelled on the fishing schooners that worked off the coast of Iceland.
They mostly make short training voyages of up to fourteen days in French waters, sometimes paying goodwill visits abroad and taking part in the Cutty Sark Tall Ships Races. The crew traditionally sleep in hammocks.
Both ships are welcome guests at international sailing gatherings, among them Sail Brest in 1992, 1996 and 2002, Sail Bremerhaven in 1992 and 2000, and the centenary of the Kiel Canal.