The Viking Ship Museum

Saturday morning, after some debate, we took off for Roskilde to visit the Viking Ship Museum. Roskilde is SW of us and not terribly far away, but it took us about 1 1/2 hours to get there with public transportation. We got to ride on the bus and the IC tog (InterCity train). The public transportation is so awesome around here and really quite easy to navigate, even with a stroller.

The Viking Ship Museum has five viking ships from the 11th century on display. They were found in the 1950s in the Roskilde Harbor. According to legend, the five boats were filled with rocks and sunk at the entrance of the harbor to thwart enemies from entering. There isn't any firm evidence of what really happened, but what was left of the five boats has been brought up and is on display. They also had exhibits of Viking weaponry, which has mostly been found in streams throughout the area, and hoards of jewelry and coins. Some of it is apparently plunder from the Viking raids, while other pieces were buried by their owners to protect them from the "Northmen".

As you can see from this rather corny shot, they also had a kiddie area with Viking costumes that you could try on and a few other activities. Pretty fun I'll have to admit, even though I wasn't terribly thrilled to do the dressing up myself!





Jared's favorite part of the museum was outdoors where they have craftsmen building replicas of the Viking ships using the same methods and tools that they would have used. This finished longboat was a warship would have held over 50 men and 100s of weapons. They also had a workshop for the archeological finds, but it was closed. We decided that we'll have to go back again in warmer weather so we can take a cruise on the boats and see more of the outdoor exhibits.

Finally, here's a pic of a wooden chain. I'm not really sure if this was something that they would have used or what, but Jared thought it was pretty cool, so maybe you will too!