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Viking World museum

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Viking World museum

Viking World (Icelandic: Víkingaheimar) is a museum in Njarðvík, Reykjanesbær, Iceland.

The museum opened on 8 May 2009, followed by a formal opening on Icelandic National Day, 17 June. The director was Elisabeth Ward; the building was designed by Guðmundur Jónsson.

Viking World has on permanent display the Íslendingur, the replica of the Gokstad Viking ship which in 2000 was sailed across the Atlantic Ocean to L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland, for the celebrations of the millennium of Leif Ericsson's voyage and then to New York. The ship was returned to Iceland and placed on exhibit in the open air until being transferred to the new museum in autumn 2008. She is suspended one and a half metres in the air so that visitors can walk underneath her hull and see the workmanship.

The museum also houses the exhibition Vikings — The North Atlantic Saga from the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.. On 1 December 2010, a 2-year temporary exhibition with materials on loan from the National Museum of Iceland opened with a heathen reburial ceremony for a body excavated at Hafurbjarnarstaðir in 1868.

As of June 17th, 2015, the museum has come under new stewardship by Mr. Bjorn Jonasson and Mr. Jonas Bjornsson and plans have been made for further investment into the museum, such as the building of a new boat, a new building next the original museum, camping grounds and a sister museum in the United States.

References

Viking World museum Wikipedia