Skansen, the open air museum

On Wednesday, we awoke not only to sun but also to a good forecast for the day, but that didn't stop us taking rain jackets and umbrellas.

We took the bus and then walked through the town past the shops, dropping into Georg Jensen for a browse and purchase.

Towards the tram, we stopped to take photos of the impressive buildings on the waterfront constructed at the end of the 19th century.








These are the towers of the Nordic museum, Swedish towers are quite distinctive.



Helpfully, some of the buildings have blue plaques which describe their history. This, the Bünsowska building, was constructed in 1886 for a timber magnate of the same name and designed by Gustaf Clason.



John was interested in this method of maintaining buildings. We saw lots of temporary structures like this where buildings were being renovated - typically two stories high and made of portakabins.





Our museum of the day was Skansen, an open air museum of Swedish days gone by. Skansen was founded in 1891 by Artur Hazelius. These two buildings, a shoemaker and a bank, were not open.









This is Boberg's Observatory.



The windmill and grain store were close to each other, of course.







This was a wealthy household (Manor) that provided two knights to the king.











I don't think that the plastic containers for garden refuse are authentic.


The garden had its own windmill and potting shed, below.



The peacock, on a roof, and peahen were wandering around.



There is also a children's zoo with owls, bears, moose and seals.















The Vastveit storehouse is from Telemark in Norway and is the oldest building in Skansen; some parts of it are 14th century. The storehouse was moved to Skansen in its first few years when Norway and Sweden were one country. When the countries separated in 1905, Skansen decided to concentrate only on Swedish history.




This is a Sami (a nomadic tribe) house complete with a stick reindeer outside the door.


This is a typical farm house.



The wall paintings are original and date from 1819.



This shows the family tree starting at 1789.



This part of the house was used by the farm workers









We returned to our hotel for our customary rest and then ate in a small french restaurant close to the hotel.





Pat and John on tour