Aperture: Jessica's SwedenBlog

Yesterday we had a full day of sightseeing!(Feb 20,2008)
First we went to Djurgarden, which is yet another island in Stockholm, that has a couple museums and a huge park.
Here we stumbled onto the Vasa Museet. Scott and I had both read about it but had no luck finding it on any map
that we had. All I knew about the Vasa was that it was a big, old boat; I had no idea of the history though. This
huge boat, so genuinely hand crafted had sat on the bottom of the oceanway for 333 years. I was absolutely amazed
at the grandeur of the ship and the history given of the time period that the museaum provided. If you ever go to
Stockholm this definately a must see!

After this we walked to Skansen, which is an open-air museum. There were wind mills, old houses and
buildings, but most importantly there was a zoo full of Nordic animals. Until this point I had never see a
live/not on TV snowy owl, grey owl( that I actually stood right next to!), a lynx that was super cute, a fox( I
know they are at Roger Williams, but this one I saw), small and hairy Icelandic/Nordic horses, wolves, reindeer,
and moose. The zoo was the highlight of Skansen.

The last big attraction of the day was going to the Nobel Museum. Here I learned about the different
Nobel prizes given and how the laureates are chosen. I also learned about Alfred Nobel, the man who started the
whole affair, after his death I might add. He had written in his will that he wanted these different prizes given
and he was leaving his wealth to fund the prizes and the organization. Displayed in the museum there were pieces
created by art students with their inspiration coming from 5 different Nobel prize winners. It was all very
interesting.

For the rest of the night we walked the streets of Gamla Stan, took the metro to a huge circular library,
had some dinner at Chutney, and then crashed!