Stockholm

Mon 7 June

Today was one of the highlights of our trip so far with a visit to the “Vasa” which was a Swedish warship that was built from 1626 to 1628. The ship foundered and sank after sailing less than a nautical mile (approx. 2 km) into her maiden voyage on 10 August 1628. Vasa was forgotten after most of her valuable bronze cannons were salvaged in the 17th century using a manned diving bell with enough air for about half an hour, brave people.

She was located again in the late 1950s, in a busy shipping lane just outside the Stockholm harbour and raised with a largely intact hull on 24 April 1961. After towing her to a dry dock she was housed in a temporary museum while being dried out and preserved until 1987 and was then moved to the Vasa Museum. The ship is one of Sweden's most popular tourist attractions and has attracted more than 25 million visitors.

Vasa was built top-heavy and had insufficient ballast. Despite an obvious lack of stability in port, she was allowed to set sail and foundered a few minutes later when she first encountered a wind stronger than a breeze. The impulsive move to set sail resulted from a combination of factors. Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus, who was abroad on the date of her maiden voyage, was impatient to see Vasa join the Baltic fleet in The Thirty Years War. At the same time, the king's subordinates lacked the political courage to discuss the ship's structural problems frankly or to have the maiden voyage postponed. An inquiry was organized by the Privy Council to find someone responsible for the disaster, but no sentences were handed out.

During the 1961 recovery, thousands of artefacts and the remains of at least 15 people were found in and around the hull of the Vasa by marine archaeologists. Among the many items found were clothing, weapons, cannons, tools, coins, cutlery, food, drink and six of the ten sails. The artefacts and the ship itself have provided historians with invaluable insight into details of naval warfare, shipbuilding techniques and everyday life in early 17th-century Sweden. No expense was spared in decorating and equipping the Vasa, one of the largest and most heavily armed warships of her time, adorned with hundreds of sculptures, all of them painted in vivid colours. She was intended to express the expansionist aspirations of Sweden and the glory of king Gustavus Adolphus.

On entering the museum we couldn’t believe the size of the ship and how well it had been restored and standing alongside is a scale model of how she looked at the time of her sinking, even without the more than 700 carved sculptures on her hull having been restored to their full

painted and guilded glory the Vasa is an impressive ship and on the wall behind the stern are several restored sculptures which were examined by microscope to find minute traces of colour to guide the restorers.

As well as the restored ship and thousands of artefacts many skeletons of those that died in the sinking are displayed together with five or six models of these people having had their features restored and dressed as they may have been at the time. A detailed examination of the skeletons has also provided information of past injuries and diseases together with dental and dietary details of each person.

In the museum there is a model of a shipyard as it may have appeared in the days that Vasa was built together with full size models of workman preparing the timbers for the construction there is also an extensive display about life in the 1600s covering all aspect of life in a town and small village.

Outside the museum there is a reproduction of a small house with its vegetable and herb garden, growing plants that would have been cultivated in those days.

Walking from the museum along the waterfront we came to a small museum with Royal boats, small gondolas, yachts and other boats used by the Royal family over the years.

Further around the waterfront we came to a complete contrast, the Stockholm Tivoli and large version of Luna Park with hundreds of young people on the first week of their school holidays enjoying being terrified on some of the fastest and steepest rides imaginable.

From the Tivoli we caught a water ferry from the island back to the Old Town and then the bus back to the hotel.