The oldest museum of the Balaton region was established by the Balaton Museum Association in 1898 “to bring the lake into vogue”. The Palace of Culture was erected on a building site donated by Prince Taszilo Festetics II, then lord of the Keszthely entail, along with about a hundred thousand bricks. The Museum was constructed between 1925 and 1928 in Neo-baroque style. Unfortunately, the whole collection of the museum was destroyed in WWII. The current collection has 380,000 items on display, and it is regarded as the richest and most comprehensive collection in Hungary to reflect the natural, historical and folklore assets of the Lake Balaton region.

In the museum of the “Hungarian Sea,” visitors are offered an interactive experience of the lake’s history and culture. Those coming to the museum can be part of a real time travel through millions of years, the evolution of Lake Balaton and its vicinity. The millennial relationship between Lake Balaton and the residents of the region is neatly demonstrated by the memorabilia of ancient cultures, and by the remnants of strongholds from Roman and mediaeval times. A 3,000-litre aquarium is on display to introduce the rich variety of fishes that live in the lake. A separate exhibition room is dedicated to the life and work of fishermen. One specific section focuses on tourism around Lake Balaton; from the material we can learn when the first people may have plunged into the water, what bathing culture was like during the happy decades before the Great War and what a summer holiday spent by the lake may have been like in the 1980s. In the part dealing with the history of shipping, we can have a look at the model version of Phoenix, the largest sailboat on Balaton of all times, which was prepared in the carpentry of the former landlords of Keszthely, the Festetics family.