Museum sights in Norway
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Ringve Museum
The Ringve Museum is Norway’s national museum for music and musical instruments. The Russian-born owner is a devoted collector of rare and antique musical instruments, which music students demonstrate. You can also browse the old barn with its rich collection of instruments from around the world. The botanic gardens, set within the surrounding 18th-century estate, are a quiet green setting for a stroll. Take bus 3 or 4 and walk up the hill.
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Tafjord Power Museum
The Tafjord Power Museum, located within a now-defunct power station, shows how the advent of hydroelectric power changed the valley. The road that climbs from the village up to the Zakarias reservoir passes through a bizarre corkscrew tunnel and, a couple of kilometres higher up, a short walking route drops to the crumbling bridge at the dam’s narrow base, where you feel at close range the stresses this 96m-high structure has to tolerate.
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B
Polar Museum
The 1st floor of this harbourside museum, in a restored early 19th-century customs house near the colourful Skansen docks, illustrates early polar research, especially the ventures of Nansen and Amundsen. Downstairs there’s a well-mounted exhibition about the hunting and trapping of fuzzy Arctic creatures on Svalbard before coal became king there. Note the nasty exploding harpoons outside; the whale didn’t stand much of a chance.
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C
Nobel Peace Center
Norwegians take pride in their role as international peacemakers, which explains the central location of the Nobel Peace Center in Aker Brygge. The centre is Oslo’s most technically advanced museum, with an array of digital displays that are intended to offer as much or as little information as the visitor desires. Don’t miss the Nobel Book on the 2nd floor or the movie theatre streaming films on the history of the prize and its winners.
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Sogn Og Fjordane Coastal Museum
The two main buildings of the Kystmuseet are chock-full of fishing exhibits and there’s a model 1900 fishing family’s home too. Also within the complex are several old warehouse buildings, moved from Florø and Måløy, and an old herring salt house. On a more contemporary theme, the Snorreankeret oil platform display illustrates the history, exploration and exploitation of the North Sea oil and gas fields.
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D
Mini Bottle Gallery
Want to see the ridiculous and enormous collection of a wealthy brewer? Check out the Mini Bottle Gallery. This 'gallery' crosses architectural elegance and haunted-house gadgetry with the crass overtures of a puerile club. As you admire tens of thousands of tiny bottles of booze set in an environment whose expensive design surpasses many museums, you're bound to wonder if the place is a joke. The answer comes readily in the bathroom.
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Dalane Folkmuseum
The Dalane Folkmuseum is divided into two parts. The more interesting main section features eight historic timber homes at Slettebø, 3.5km north of town just off the Rv42. The other section is the Egersund Fayance Museum, a walkable 1.5km northeast of town. It displays the history and wares of Egersund Fayance, the ceramic and porcelain firm that sustained the entire district from 1847 to 1979.
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Otternes
Between Flåm and Aurland and high above the fjord perches the restored hamlet of Otternes, a complex of 27 restored buildings, the earliest dating from the 17th century. To get full value from the visit, follow the one-hour guided tour (around NOK20 extra; available in English four times daily) and plan a rest break to lick a locally made organic ice cream or a bowl of rømmegrøt, a rich sour-cream porridge.
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Norwegian Mountain Museum
Acting as the visitors centre for Jotunheimen National Park, this worthwhile mountain museum contains mountaineering memorabilia, exhibits on natural history (the woolly mammoth is a highlight) and cultural and industrial activity in the Norwegian mountains. There’s also an excellent 10-minute mountain slide show, a discussion of tourism and its impact on wilderness and, upstairs, a scale model of the park.
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Railway Museum
From early June to early September, another popular excursion is the Sunday tour by veteran steam train between Garnes and Midtun. It begins at 9am on the historic ferry M/S Bruvik from Bryggen to the railway museum at Garnes and from there the teak-panelled train inches 18km to Midtun. The whole trip takes four hours (adult/child Nkr200/100). The train trip alone costs Nkr120/60 return.
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Museum
Outside, this charming little museum presents a traditional Sami settlement, complete with an early home, temporary dwellings and outbuildings such as the kitchen, sauna, and huts for storing fish, potatoes and lichen (also called ‘reindeer moss’ and prime reindeer fodder). Inside are Sami handicrafts, farming and reindeer-herding implements, religious icons and artefacts, and winter transport gear.
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E
Sunnmøre Museum
Ålesund’s celebrated Sunnmøre Museum is 4km east of the centre. Here, at the site of the old Borgundkaupangen trading centre, active from the 11th to 16th centuries, over 50 traditional buildings have been relocated. Ship-lovers will savour the collection of around 40 historic boats, including replicas of Viking-era ships and a commercial trading vessel from around AD 1000. Take bus 618 or 624.
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Grimstad Maritime Museum
This important museum, in the office of the 1842 Hasseldalen shipyard, provides a glimpse into Grimstad’s history during ‘the days of the white sails’. While you’re there it’s worth climbing the short track from the end of Batteriveien up the Binabben hill for a view over Grimstad. Make sure you visit the Ibsenhuset Museum first or the combined ticket won’t work.
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Norwegian Mining Museum
This worthwhile mining museum, in an 1844 smelter, tells the story of mining in Kongsberg with relics, models and mineral displays; the old smelting furnaces still survive in the basement. In the same building, other sections include the Royal Mint, which was moved from Akershus Fortress in Oslo to the source of the silver in 1686, as well as a skiing museum and other local exhibitions.
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Aalesunds Museum
The town museum illustrates the history of sealing, fishing, shipping and industry in the Sunnmøre region, the fire of 1904, the Nazi WWII occupation and the town’s distinctive Art Nouveau architecture. There’s also a collection of boats and ships, including the Uræd lifeboat (piloted across the Atlantic in 1904 by an intrepid Ole Brude), and an 1812 barn, converted into an old-time grocery.
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Tromsø Forsvarsmuseum
The southern end of Tromsø’s mainland was first developed by the Nazis in 1940 as a coastal artillery battery, complete with six big guns. The cannons have been restored as the basis of the Tromsø Forsvarsmuseum, which also includes a restored commando bunker and an exhibition on the giant German battleship Tirpitz, sunk at Tromsø on 12 November 1944. Take bus 12 or 28.
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Rogaland Art Museum
This museum, 2.5km south of the town centre, displays Norwegian art from the 18th century to the present, including the haunting Gamle Furutrær and other landscape paintings by Stavanger’s own Lars Hertervig (1830–1902). A nine-sided annexe houses the largest assemblage of mid-20th-century Norwegian art, including work by Harald Dal, Kai Fjell, Arne Ekeland and others.
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Stavanger Museum
The large eight-part museum, with its sites scattered around Stavanger, could easily fill a sightseeing day, but you’d have to keep up a brisk pace to fit them all in. The first museum you visit costs Nkr60/30 per adult/child, with each extra museum visited the same day costing Nkr20; student and senior prices are the same as for children. The children’s museum has separate pricing.
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Whaling Museum
The impressive Whaling Museum in Sandefjord charts the history of Norwegian whaling, with photos, equipment and information on marine life. The museum’s exhibits are complemented by the 1950s whaleboat Southern Actor, which is moored at the harbour; entry is by the same ticket. There’s also the striking sculpture monument to whalers by the water.
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Medieval Age Museum
Should you coincide with its restricted opening hours, don't overlook - as many visitors do - its Medieval Age Museum. Displayed around excavations of the old trading centre are well documented artefacts discovered on-site and reproductions of medieval illustrations depicting the way of life of the west Norwegian coastal folk who inhabited this thriving community. A pity that entry hours are so reduced…
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Vest-Agder Folk Museum
Located 4km east of town on the E18, the open-air Vest-Agder Folk Museum houses a collection of 40 farmsteads and hamlets from the Setesdalen region and Kristiansand itself. It also includes displays of traditional costumes, art and children’s toys. Folk dancing performances are sometimes held in summer at 5pm on Wednesdays. There’s also a scale model of Kristiansand Old Town.
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Norwegian Forestry Museum
The expansive Norwegian Forestry Museum, 1km south of central Elverum, covers the multifarious uses and enjoyments of Norwegian forests. It includes a nature information centre, children’s workshop, geological and meteorological exhibits, wood carvings, an aquarium, nature dioramas with all manner of stuffed native wildlife (including a mammoth) and a 20,000-volume reference library.
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Fredrikstad Museum
The Fredrikstad Museum is housed in the same building as the tourist office in Gamlebyen and is well worth a browse. The downstairs area houses temporary exhibitions, while upstairs you’ll find scale models of the Old Town and an interesting collection of relics from three centuries of Fredrikstad’s civilian, military and industrial activities. Also on the top floor is a military museum.
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Pomor Museum
The simple, appealing little Pomor museum outlines (in Russian only) the historic Pomor trade with mainland Russia, plus Russian mining and history on Svalbard. Especially worthwhile are the excellent geological exhibits and the collection of artefacts suggesting Russian activity in Svalbard prior to the archipelago’s accepted European ‘discovery’ by Willem Barents.
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Archaeological Museum
This well-presented museum, traces 11,000 years of human history, including the Viking Age. Exhibits include skeletons, tools, a runestone and a description of the symbiosis between prehistoric humans and their environment. There’s also a full programme of activities for kids (eg treasure hunts) in summer and it’s making a welcome move to more interactive exhibits.
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