Djurgården travel guide
For centuries it served as a hunting ground for Sweden’s royal family but today the leafy island of Djurgården is best known as Stockholm’s museum capital. It makes for a pleasant escape from the bustle of Norrmalm and Gamla Stan, both a quick tram or boat ride away, and there are enough good attractions here to keep you busy for days on end.
Some of the city’s biggest and best museums are out here. The Vasa Museum, purpose built to house a superbly well-preserved 17th-Century warship, is perhaps Stockholm’s most intriguing tourist attraction – and one of the most visited, too.
The nearby Abba Museum draws in music fans from around the world, while the vast collection at Nordiska tells the story of Swedish trends and traditions from the 1500s to the present day. At the cheeky Spritmuseum you can learn more about Sweden’s long and sometimes troubled relationship with booze.
Other must-see sights found on Djurgården include Skansen, a vast open-air museum complete with its own zoo and Gröna Lund, a pretty, old-fashioned fairground with a couple of decent scream rides. Accommodation and eating options are extremely limited in this part of town, though snack stalls are abundant and some of the museums have reasonably priced cafés.
Just west of Djurgården and linked to it by a year-round ferry service, the much smaller island of Skeppsholmen has a couple of museums of its own. The best of the lot is Moderna Museet (Stockholm’s main modern art gallery), which has bright white galleries bursting with works by big-name artists.
Both Skeppsholmen and Kastellholmen, the tiny speck of an island adjoining its southern tip, afford gorgeous views across the water to Gamla Stan.
