Polar Bear Hunt 2015 - Day 3

The Museums on Bygdøy

Today was museums day. After a short ferry ride, we landed at Bygdøy. There are six museums in a small area on this peninsula. You can walk between each of them, and the ferry calls at the start and send of the walking tour. We started with the Fram Museum and the Kon-Tki and Norse Maritime Museums. That took all morning, so after purchasing cold drinks at the small food stall, we sat in the warm shade beside the water to eat the bread rolls we had bought from the bakery in Oslo where we had our breakfast. Then we headed along the road, passing large houses and estates towards the next museum. You can use the local bus service that comes right down to the Fram Museum, but we decided to walk in the warm sun. Our next stop was the Holocaust Museum, now housed in a large mansion that had been the home of the war-time leader of Norway, the Nazi-backed Quisling. Although most of the exhibits were in Norwegian, they did provide us with an iPad that provided brief translations. From there we walked on to the Viking Museum to see the Viking boats that had been unearthed near Oslo and then on to the ferry terminal and back to Oslo.

The Fram Museum

Commemorating the famous explorers.		The ferry across to Bygdøy.
Looking back at expensive apartments.	And the Art Gallery.
	Where there is money and water there are yachts...	And fancy houses.
The Fram Museum.	Art??	Arctic Explorers:Olav Bjaarland; Oscar Wisting; Roald Amundsen; Sverre Hassel; Helmer Hanssen.
The hull of the Fram.	The propeller and rudder. The prop could be winched up into the hull for protection from the ice.	Looking along the hull.
The bow.		The upper deck and wheel.
	Weigh the Anchor...
Inside, the main cabin.	The galley.	Some of the timbers designed to stop the ship being crushed in the ice.
	The rigging.
	Diorama of the ship stuck in the ice.	A friendly native.

The Kon Tiki Museum

Across the road from the Fram Museum is the relic of another Norwegian explorer - Thor Heyerdahl. He built a balsawood raft and set out to sail it across the Pacific Ocean to Polynesia in an attempt to demonstrate that the Polynesians could have originated from South America. He departed Peru in April 1947 and smashed into a reef on an atoll of the Tuamotu Group in August 1947. The raft was salvaged by the French authorities and was eventually taken to Oslo and preserved in the Museum at Bygdøy

Kon Tiki on left, Fram on right.	The Kon Tiki Raft.
		Thor Heyerdahl's later raft, the Ra.

The Holocaust and Viking Museums

After leaving the Kon Tiki Museum we walked along the road towards the other museums, catching glimpses of quite a few large and imposing houses amongst the trees. The museums are well signposted. We turned off to find the Holocaust Museum, set up in a large house to record the events that occured in Oslo and elsewhere in Norway during the Nazi invasion and control of the country in 1940-1945. The house was previously the home of Vidkun Quisling, who was the self-declared president of Norway during the Nazi occupation. His name has become synonymous with collaborationist governments.

From there we walked on to the Viking Museum that houses several well preserved Viking longboats, and then back down to the water to wait for the fery back to Oslo.

Leaving the Fram Museum.	The entrance to the Holocaust Museum.	The Museum - once it was the home of Vidkun Quisling.
The Viking Museum.	One of the well preserved viking long boats.
		Tourists - every one fiddling with their phones.
Outside the Viking Museum and the cafe with cold drinks.	The road back down to the ferry.	And our ferry.

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Last updated: 8/10/2015