July 8, 2023
Koge to Roskilde (July 8, 2023)
Plus a Visit to the Viking Ship Museum
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Today was a short ride (25 km) but a big sight at the end of it. We were riding to Roskilde to see the Viking Ship Museum. The ride out of Koge was fun. It was Saturday morning and there was a market in town so lots of people were out and about. Koge is larger than it looks on the map. Besides the touristy harbor area with our cool dinner restaurant of last night it has some industrial port related activities, related (we think) of agricultural exports and the mining of flint along the east coast of Koege Bay at the western edge of the Baltic. We rode by an open pit mine with a lot of chalk as a byproduct of the flint extraction. Flint was a valuable mineral and had a lot to do with the prosperity of the region for hundreds of years. Historically it was used for making stone tools and starting fires and was the primary material used in the Stone Age. Outside of Koge we rode through a large industrial/warehouse area; there was absolutely nobody there (obviously Danes don’t work on Saturdays!) but there were large well-marked grade-separated cycle trails on both sides of the road. The commitment Denmark has made to cycling is impressive.
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We arrived in Roskilde for our one-night stay at the Scandic Park Hotel (rooms were nice but the hallways had pink walls and green carpet). We quickly cleaned up and then rode down to the Viking Ship Musuem, which is a large compound of indoor and outside stuff to see. The short story: in the 1950’s some divers discovered five Viking era ships (around 1000 ce) in the harbor outside Roskilde. The pieces of the ships were excavated and a bunch of lucky academic types then got to spend five years putting the pieces together and the Danish government created this fabulous museum around the ships, which is now world-famous.
This story of the ships is amazing itself: they were old ships that the leadership of Roskilde deliberately sunk in the harbor to stop invaders from raiding Roskilde. At the time Roskilde was the seat of the Christian Archbishop and the head of the monarchy of Denmark so considered a prime target for their enemies. (The family monarchy moved to Copenhagen in 1450.) In addition, the museum includes a large traditional boat building facility so as not to lose the culture and methods used by the Vikings to build their craft. We took a short tour of the boatyard and learned about Viking boatbuilding — Vikings built their boats using the clinker method. The clinker method of overlapping hull planks meant the Vikings could build hulls that were more waterproof and stronger than the other style of ship building at the time, the carvel method.
The boatbuilders have been working on building replicas of the five boats they found each taking years to complete. You could see their passion for the projects; once the boats are built the crews then take them on various tours around the world. It was a fascinating detailed look at a culture we knew nothing about it. Hey, that’s why we travel.
Today's ride: 25 km (16 miles)
Total: 400 km (248 miles)
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