I have been to my fair share of museums over the past 351 days. I am now at the point where I only go to a Museum if it is a little out of the ordinary in some way and comes highly recommended by friends, locals or blogs. The Vasa Museum was recommended by all 3.

The Vasa was a 17th Century warship built under the kings orders as the flagship of the new Swedish Navy. The ship keeled over and sunk after only traveling 1.5 km on its maiden voyage in the harbour of Stockholm. It lay at the bottom of the harbour until the early 1960’s when it was salvaged intact after 333 years under water. The ship is extremely well preserved due to the polluted Swedish bay which killed off wood eating worms which would usually tear a ship like this to pieces in a matter of years.

It was never determined what exactly caused the ship to sink, but scientists believe it was due to the ship being built with two levels of canons which made the ship top heavy, and the builders not using enough ballast. Poor design really.

The Vasa Museum has the beautiful old massive ship on display after some minor restoration and repair work for the public to view. The ship is 98 percent original and is the largest, oldest and most complete ship of its kind to ever be salvaged. Definitely a one of a kind Museum.