Wanderung 34

We decided to travel out to Roskilde to see the Viking ship museum there, and managed to catch the sequence of bus, city train, and inter-city train, and rural bus to get out there in about 50 minutes. I recognized the building from previous visits, but had forgotten that the entrance was over in a workshop area where they were currently building replicas of the Viking ships and replicas of other early sailing boats. They also had the replica of the Viking Longship that they had first built and then actually used to sail over to Ireland and back, a rather brave thing to do.

The workshop area was quite interesting as we saw small wooden ships from other areas and for the post-Viking era. The regional variations were interesting and partly due to local style variations and partly due to different woods being available. Pine was dominant in Norway, so the large warship built in Norway was built from pine. The dominant tree in Denmark, however, was oak, so the coastal merchant ship and small warship built in Denmark were built from oak, which I would have thought of as a more durable wood for ships. But the guide mentioned that all such ships had at best a 30-40 year usable life span.

Looking at some of the hulls under construction, I was pretty sure I saw bronze nails or rivets used in one hull, but our guide later clarified that the Viking ships were pegged together using iron nails. The lines for the rigging was woven from fibers and skins, and apparently that held up well enough in use.

The curious reason the ship hulls in the main museum area were preserved was that they were filled with rocks and then sunk in the narrow channel leading from the bay into the city. Roskilde was the seat of the Danish royal family at that time, and they sank the ships in order to block sea attacks by other, rival Viking groups. In particular, the Norwegian or even Swedish versions of the Viking society would have been a clear and present danger for a town with a fancy Christian church and a lot of royal wealth lying around.

When the ships were sunk, the rocks at first just held them under water and then over time gradually pushed the hulls down into the mud. The mud was basically lacking oxygen, so the wood was preserved across the centuries down to their excavation in the 1960s.

The warships or Longships were easily distinguishable due to the huge number of oar holes in the upper sides. The cargo ships, in contrast had only 2-4 such holes and apparently only used the oars for maneuvers near the docks and so forth. Both longships and cargo ships used a single square sail, and that was efficient enough that they could sail up to 60 degrees into the wind.

After several hours, we were tired but had a lunch at the Knarr cafe just outside the entrance to the museum. Somewhat revived, we took the 203 bus back to Rosklide train station and boarded an intercity train back to Copenhagen's main train station.

On the train ride back to the main Copenhagen train station, we decided to next see the Royal Stables, which are part of the Christianburg Royal Palace, as the palace was only a short bus ride away from the train station. Once we found the correct entrance to the stables, we toured first the small museum cum gift shop there and then the main stable area, which housed both about 10-15 white horses and maybe 12 or so carriages.

The horses were pure white when adults, just like the Lippizaner breed of horses, but they were a Czech breed and quite friendly and docile, whereas Lippizaners were originally military horses and probably not selected for friendliness!

I was surprised that there were so many Royal carriages. Apparently they never really discard them, and have kept several of the older ones in a usable condition. The closed carriages are used, for example, when it's raining and some Royal function has to be done and the open carriages can't be used. My favorite carriage was one covered in gold leaf, but a couple of the really old Royal carriages had also been covered in gilt, now somewhat faded. The most curious carriage had a toilet built into the rear seat, which was undoubtedly useful under certain circumstances but otherwise somewhat odd.

Before being thrown out, we watched the evening feeding. Some horses waited patiently, while others tried to sneak a snack while the hay was still in the cart

We shopped at Aldi on our way back home, and by the time we had returned and eaten, I was truly tired. We chatted away for an hour or two, but then I just collapsed into bed and Monika followed an hour or so later.