A harbor or harbour (see spelling differences), or haven, is a place where ships, boats, and barges can seek shelter from stormy weather, or else are stored for future use. Harbors can be natural or artificial. An artificial harbor has deliberately-constructed breakwaters, sea walls, or jettys, or otherwise, they could have been constructed by dredging, and these require maintenance by further periodic dredging. An example of the former kind is at Long Beach Harbor, California, and an example of the latter kind is San Diego Harbor, California, which was, under natural conditions, too shallow for modern merchant ships and warships.
In contrast, a natural harbor is surrounded on several sides by prominences of land. An example of this kind of harbor is San Francisco Bay, California.
Harbors and ports are often confused with each other. A port is a facility for loading and unloading vessels; ports are usually located in harbors.
Read more about Harbor: Artificial Harbors, Natural Harbors, Ice-free Harbors, Important Harbors
Famous quotes containing the word harbor:
“The disabusing a man strongly possessed with an opinion of his own worth is the very same ill office that was done to the fool at Athens, who fancied all the ships that came into the harbor were his own.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“It is said that the British Empire is very large and respectable, and that the United States are a first-rate power. We do not believe that a tide rises and falls behind every man which can float the British Empire like a chip, if he should ever harbor it in his mind.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
““When was I ever anything but kind to him?
But I’ll not have the fellow back,” he said.
“I told him so last haying, didn’t I?
‘If he left then,’ I said, ‘that ended it.’
What good is he? Who else will harbor him
At his age for the little he can do?”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)