''Viking'' (also known by the ship type as a prefix, Barken Viking) is a four-masted steel

barque A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts having the fore- and mainmasts rigged square and only the mizzen (the aftmost mast) rigged fore and aft. Sometimes, the mizzen is only partly fore-and-aft rigged, b ...

, built in 1906 by

Burmeister & Wain Burmeister & Wain was a large established Danish shipyard and leading diesel engine producer headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded by two Danes and an Englishman, its earliest roots stretch back to 1846. Over its 150-year history, it ...

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

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. She is reported to be the biggest sailing ship ever built in Scandinavia. In the 21st century her sailing days have drawn to a close, and is now moored as botel in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Ship history

''Viking'' was originally built as a sail training ship for the rapidly growing Danish merchant fleet. At that time, seaworthiness and cargo capacity were given top priority. One day in July 1909, while carrying a full cargo of

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from Australia, Captain Niels Clausen recorded a speed record in the ship's log: . On 25 February 1917, she was sighted and boarded by the German commerce raider . Unusually, the Germans then allowed her to proceed because being Danish, she was a neutral ship. This was something of a lucky escape, because within weeks Germany would return to unrestricted marine warfare, a tactic that would have meant the ship's indefinite sinking. In 1929 she was registered under the Finnish flag, and joined the

Åland Åland ( fi, Ahvenanmaa: ; ; ) is an autonomous and demilitarised region of Finland since 1920 by a decision of the League of Nations. It is the smallest region of Finland by area and population, with a size of 1,580 km2, and a populat ...

-based Erikson fleet of tall ships. She was part of Erikson's fleet until 1950. Viking was about to be scrapped in the late 1940s, but was eventually saved by the Swedish government in 1950 and moored in Gothenburg. A suspension bridge built in the late 1960s has effectively locked the ship in, since the masts are taller than the bridge. It is unlikely she ever will sail the open seas again. In January 2021 she was partially demasted to be able to pass under Älvsborgsbron. Early on January 24 2021 she was towed to Falkenberg by tug boats Svitzer Thor and Svitzer Bob. She participated in several of the Great Grain Races from Port Victoria, South Australia to Falmouth, Cornwall. ''Barken Viking'' won the Grain Race of 1948. David James was an apprentice on her voyage around the world in 1937-38, which is described in his biography. Robson, J.,(1998, One Man in his Time. David Robb Muirhead (1921-78) wrote a diary and took photos of his voyage on the Viking as a working passenger in 1948, which records are held in the State Library of South Australia. Barken viking gothenburg 20051011

There are only ten four-masted barques and one four-masted full-rigged ship (the '' Falls of Clyde'') in existence, and only five of these still sail ('' Sedov'', '' Kruzenshtern'', '' Sea Cloud I'', '' Nippon Maru II'', '' Kaiwo Maru II''). A few more are still afloat and berthed in various harbors (''

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), ''

Moshulu ''Moshulu'' is a four-masted steel barque, built as ''Kurt'' by William Hamilton and Company at Port Glasgow in Scotland in 1904. The largest remaining original windjammer, she is currently a floating restaurant docked in Penn's Landing, Phil ...

'' (

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), '' Passat'' (

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, Germany), '' Pommern'' ( Mariehamn, Finland), ''

Nippon Maru is a Japanese museum ship and former training vessel. She is permanently docked in Yokohama harbor, in Nippon Maru Memorial Park.Yokohama Visitors Guide''Nippon Maru''; retrieved 2012-6-28. She was built by Kawasaki Shipbuilding Corporation ...

'' (

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, Japan), and ''Viking''). ''Viking'' came to Gothenburg in Sweden permanently in 1950, as a home for various shipping organizations, and later became a school of seamanship. Today it is moored at

Lilla Bommen Lilla Bommen is a part of Gothenburg harbor used for visiting boats and also the name given to the land surrounding the harbor. The eponymous building along with The Göteborg Opera house and the barque Viking are all located at Lilla Bommen. ...

as hotel "Barken Viking". The owner of the hotel is ESS Hotell AB. Finnish artist Lena Ringbom-Lindén, one of a few females on board a ship at that time, sailed on ''Viking'' on one of its voyages to Australia. She wrote of her experience in two books, ''Flicka på skepp'' ("Girl on Ship") and ''Skeppet och Lena'' ("Lena and The Ship").

Cargoes

''Vikings cargos: *

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- Denmark *

Coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

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) *

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Timber Lumber is wood that has been processed into dimensional lumber, including beams and planks or boards, a stage in the process of wood production. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, w ...

- Sweden ( Sundsvall) *

Wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeologi ...

- Australia

References

External links

Official site of Barken Viking
{{coord, 57.712389, N, 11.965472, E, region:SE_type:city, display=title Viking, Barque Viking, Barque Viking, Barque Merchant ships of Finland Barques Windjammers Training ships Four-masted ships Ships built in Copenhagen 1906 ships Museums in Gothenburg 1906 in Denmark Economic history of Denmark World War I merchant ships of Denmark World War II merchant ships of Finland Economic history of Finland Tall ships of Sweden National symbols of Sweden Scandinavian history

Ship history

Cargoes

See also

References

External links