The Bygdoy maritime museum complex is an all day adventure. We opt to visit all three museums in the complex. We start with the Norwegian Maritime Museum where we get to see a man building a Viking ship using ancient methods (and a few power tools). It is fascinating to see the overlapping construction and to know that these ships crossed oceans.

Other galleries have maritime art, model ships, and boat artifacts. We see lighthouse lenses and walk on an early ferry boat. Following a timeline on the floor, we walk through maritime history. In the children’s area, we adventure under the sea with a popular character from Norwegian children’s literature.

In a smaller annex across the street, we get up close and personal with the small fishing boats that were used for centuries by families along the Norwegian coastline. The boats are shallow and cramped. I think they would be alarming to sail on a clear day and unimaginable in a storm. No wonder so many were lost at sea. The boats have been used across centuries. Clearly I am no mariner.

The Fram museum is dedicated to the polar expeditions of Roald Amundsen. We are able to board both the Fram (the ship used to help Amundsen be the first to reach the South Pole) and the Gjoa. We see his plane he tried to fly over the North Pole and kayaks and supply sleds. The man was obsessed.

I don’t know what makes a person want to face death in order to be the “first”. Early plans included letting the boat get stuck in the ice in the hope that the current would take them to the pole. Trapped in ice on one expedition, the men face death but for the hospitality of the arctic inhabitants. There were polar bear encounters and endless injuries, but they endured. You have to be a special kind of crazy to set out in a wooden boat amidst glaciers and then to trek over the ice for days pulling the supplies that keep you alive behind you.

We leave the arctic explorers behind and head across the street to the Kon Tiki museum for a different kind of crazy. This small museum houses the Kon Tiki raft that Thor Heyerdahl and crew floated across the Pacific Ocean from Peru to Tahiti, just to prove it is possible. 101 days on a raft. . In the ocean… To show that maybe Tahitians came from South America.

I guess it is a visceral desire to explore. An obsession. Not content with his success, Heyerdahl built another boat out of reeds and sailed from North Africa to Barbados. Explorers must explore. I don’t really get it. Wanderlust I understand. Risking your life to prove a point…not so much.

The sea does have a timeless allure. It pulls us with its beauty and promise of what lies on the horizon. Thankfully they have invented sonar, powerful engines and stabilizers. Even landlubbers like me need a little ocean voyage every now and then. I just like mine from a modern cruise ship.