Olympic Museum in Lausanne

When we were in Lausanne, Switzerland we visited the site of the Olympic Museum (French: Musée olympique).  The museum (not far from the International Olympic Committee headquarters) houses permanent and temporary exhibits relating to the Olympics. With more than 10,000 pieces, the museum is the largest archive of Olympic Games in the world.  It houses, among many other things all of the olympic torches, a version of all the medals from the Olympic games, and is the permanent home of the Olympic flame between games.

Unfortunately, the main museum is undergoing major renovations for the next few months.  Therefore, the museum has set up a temporary exhibition on a boat in front of the Olympic Park.  This exhibition houses the most visited pieces from the last 20 years of the olympics.

Below are some pictures.

This is a countdown to the start of the summer games in Rio.

This museum houses the olympic flame in between games.

This is the boat which houses the temporary exhibit.

A status outside the museum.

This is a miniature replica of the "Bird's Nest" used in the 2008 Beijing Olympics.  

This is the olympic torches and metals from the 1948 games in London, the 1952 games in Oslo and the 1952 games in Helsinki.

This is the torch and metals from the 2000 games in Sydney.

This is the torches from the 2010 Vancouver games and the London games in 2012.

Here are the metals from the 1896 games in Athina, 1900 Paris games and the 1904 games in St. Louis.

This is the mascot from the London games in 2012.

The torch from the 2012 London games.

The museum had a basketball signed by the 1992 "USA Dream Team".

I thought is was funny that whoever put this in the display did not know much about basketball.  Otherwise, why would you highlight Chris Mullen and John Stockton when you also have signatures of Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird.

This is a shoe that Carl Lewis wore.

Lausanne is clearly proud to be the world headquarters of the olympics.