Tag Archives: Natural History Museum

Jul30

The Vienna Natural History Museum – Naturhistorisches Museum Wien – Part 1 (The Natural History)

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Monday, 01-July-2024


After an equestrian tour, three churches, and a crypt, I was ready for some SCIENCE.

Now… where had I seen some SCIENCE recently? Ahh yes – the Art History Museum!



Well… sort of. You see, dear readers, the Art History museum has a twin. Literally, a twin building, immediately across the gardens, built as a mirror. Art History, presented as one part of a twin pairing with Natural History. Kind of a neat idea, isn’t it?

I thought so. So did Emperor Franz Joseph, who opened both buildings simultaneously in 1891. Guess I’m in good company, huh?



I walked over. Bought tickets, had a slice of Vienna cake and a coffee, and then ventured into the exhibits.



Holy crap were there exhibits. Rows upon rows, ranks upon ranks. Minerals, gems, meteorites, fossils and placards.

I tried my best to focus and enjoy and learn, but… I’m going to be honest here. I got pretty saturated. There was just so much to see, so much to enjoy and to appreciate and to just take in. Descriptions of how gems formed, detailed analysis of the mineral deposits found in Austria and abroad and how they impacted history. A full walkthrough of an ancient salt mine, in more depth than even the Wieliczka mine got into. Plants and animals and even an Animatronic Dinosaur! Placards in German and English, some in just German…



I walked, I learned, and I became overwhelmed. I enjoyed it, until I didn’t… and then I simply walked. I didn’t stay longer than I wanted to, but I will admit that the last few rooms and exhibits definitely went by a bit quickly.

Thankfully that was expected and planned for, though, and those final rooms were examples of taxidermy animals from… drumroll please… North America! That wasn’t an accident either – I’d made a point to save those for last, just in case I got overloaded… so they made for a nice little send-off before I headed out, and set my sights on dinner…

Jul30

The Vienna Natural History Museum – Naturhistorisches Museum Wien – Part 2 (The Art)

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Monday, 01-July-2024


Is it strange that some of my favorite art is from the Natural History Museum?

I mean, it feels strange. But then again, my favorite style of art is representative landscapes, which are pretty natural and historical, so…


As strange as it feels, I was absolutely captivated by the art of the Natural History Museum in Vienna. Throughout the main museum they had paintings up, generally way up near the top of the rooms where they were quite hard to see, showcasing some of the places where the minerals and specimens on exhibit had been found.


It took me a few rooms before I even noticed them, but once I did I saw soaring mountains, deep open-pit mines, locations near Austria and as far away as the Badlands of the United States. Buildings, ancient civilizations… just absolutely beautiful pieces. Any of which I would adore to have copies of.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find any postcards or other prints of these… and so, my own photography shall suffice to document the journey.





Jun12

The Perlan Museum

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Monday, 20-May-2024


One last post about Iceland.

I’m sad to be writing this final post, but also a bit amazed that there’s so many from such a short period of time… Iceland really is an amazing country, and a great place to explore and adventure.

It’s good that I should end my adventures in Iceland with a full overview of the land of Iceland itself – the Perlan Museum, a Natural History Museum that charts Iceland from when it first broke above the surface of the ocean through to the present day.

There’s a lot of amazing exhibits, and I took pictures of all of them, so please peruse and enjoy the placards and displays that kept me busy for multiple hours in the afternoon. Perlan stayed open a bit later than many other museums, which helped me see everything after an already-full day of adventure, but even then I don’t think I caught every section… I know I missed the planetarium section, which definitely bummed me out a bit because it showed the Northern Lights.

I did get to see the Volcano demo, though, where they somehow piped in Volcano smell! It was a surprisingly pleasant smell of smoldering moss with a hint of sulfur, and really added a neat depth to the video.

Anyways. Yeah – Perlan. Great museum, cool building with interesting architecture, and glorious exhibits. Great end to a great bit of adventure in a great country!





Ohh man, one quick piece that I adored. In the pictures above you can see a story projected onto a Redwood round, that was gifted to Iceland by the US government on Iceland’s 1,100 year settlement anniversary. The redwood round is from a tree approximately 1,300 years old. I mean, how much of a power move is it to say, “Hey, Iceland, here’s a tree that’s been around longer than people have been on your soil”. Just… dang, man.

At least they didn’t do something like “Hey Iceland, here’s a Native American artifact. It’s 1,100 years old, just like your settlement! It was celebrating their 19,000th year in North America!”