Museo Nao Victoria

Museo Nao Victoria (Chile)

Nao Victoria Replica in the Museum
Established	2011
Location	Punta Arenas, Chile
Type	Maritime Museum
Website	http://www.naovictoria.cl/

The Nao Victoria Museum is located in Punta Arenas, Chile, and has been open to the public since 1 October 2011. The museum is private, the owner has received the Medal of the President of Chile for his work in promoting national identity during the celebrations for the bicentenary of the independence of the South American country. Spanish Vice Consul in Punta Arenas gave the entrepreneur the prize "Hispanic Identity" for the building of the Nao Victoria Replica.

The museum's goal is to be interactive and offer its visitors the experience of interacting with replicas of the ships that contributed to the discovery of the area, colonization of the territory, or have a special and historic heritage significance for the Magallanes Region of Chile. The replicas were built using traditional shipbuilding techniques.

The main collection of the museum is the full-size replicas of historic ships on display along the Straits of Magellan. Replicas of weapons and ancient navigation tools are also exhibited as well as copies of documents and books relating to the historic ships and an outdoor shipbuilding workshop.

Today the museum has three ship replicas:

Nao Victoria, was a carrack, 27 metres (89 ft) long, 7 metres (23 ft) wide, that was part of the fleet commanded by Ferdinand Magellan that discovered the waterway around southern tip of the South American continent. Later, commanded by Juan Sebastian Elcano, she was the only ship of the five to complete the first-time circumnavigation of the globe. Commanded by Duarte Barbosa, Nao Victoria participated in the Discovery of Chile, being the first to explore the region in 1520, and discovering or naming Patagonia, Cape Virgenes, the Straits of Magellan, Tierra del Fuego, the Pacific Ocean and other milestones.