Gustav II Adolf, King of Sweden was quite a king. He brought Sweden from obscurity to a leading power in the 17thcentury Baltic region by his military success in the 30 Years’ War. He unified the country, expelled Catholicism and mandated Lutheranism (this was at the height of the Reformation). Incidentally, his devotion to Luther was probably somewhat less than his desire to acquire Catholic properties and wealth, which he did quite handsomely.
So here is Gustav Adolf the Great (as he was later named by a grateful nation) fighting three wars he inherited from his Dad when he ascended the throne at age 16. He faced Germany, Denmark and his first cousin, the king of Poland. Gustav was a dedicated arterialist; he liked to shoot big guns. He ordered five ships to help in his cause; the Vasa was to carry 74 guns, roughly equivalent to the US Constitution 150 years or so later.
The man who designed the ship died one year after finishing the plans; others completed the work. In order to fit all those canons a second gun deck was added. The result: a top-heavy design. Some were concerned but the ship set sail, made it roughly 1,400 yards and sank. The first puff of wind caused the Vasa to heel over considerably and because the portholes were open the ship took on water and sank to the bottom. It didn’t roll over; it sank straight down.
The Vasa museum where the reconstructed ship is displayed is fantastic: the whole ship was submerged in clay that helped preserve much of it. Painstaking work to preserve the remains in a polyurethane kind of coating was done and all the pieces fit together in a jigsaw like process. The shear size of the thing is amazing: over 200 feet long – see the pictures. The museum displays artifacts found in the wreckage; skeletal remains were analyzed and mock-ups made of the persons’ heads and facial features. We spent an hour but needed a day or two.
I got to thinking – why are we visiting a shrine to a mistake, and engineering screw-up and a monument to bureaucrats too frightened by authority to point out the problem that several saw before the disastrous maiden voyage?
But wait, the Swedes weren’t the first nation to fear an enemy and attempt engineering feats never before accomplished, failing multiple times before one model finally worked and Allan Shepard finally made it into space. See the movie Hidden Figuresfor details. And then there were the 0-rings on the Challenger that some engineers feared would fail at cold temperatures. They couldn’t break through the bureaucracy in time either.
The next ship Sweden corrected the errors of the Vasa in the next ship they built. It sailed successfully for 30 years. We learn by doing, sometimes the hard way.
Afterwards we walked to a nice restaurant for Swedish meatballs, mashed potatoes and a chocolate treat for desert. Then we went for a nice river cruise that ended back at our ship around 5 PM. We were back on shore at 6:15 for a two-hour walking tour of old town. I’ll let the pictures do the talking, except to say that Stockholm has the curb appeal that Helsinki lacks. It has the medieval Old Town, narrow streets, tons of interesting shops and restaurants and everything else a tourist can crave.
This was the last day of school for many Stockholm students. They were out celebrating in force. Take a look at the picture of a bunch of kids riding around in the back of a dump truck down the streets of the city.
One other neat activity today: early this morning we sailed through the Stockholm Archipelago – 30,000 islands that are part of Stockholm. Great light and interesting shoreline scenes all the way. There are said to be 10,000 residents and 50,000 summer folks; it’s Stockholm’s summer getaway.
Our bags are packed and out in the hallway, ready for our transfer to the Stockholm airport for our trip back to Bergen and the next leg of our adventure. Stay tuned!
