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I recall reading about some Buddhist artefacts found at Viking sites. That could put their travels much older than whats mentioned here.

http://irisharchaeology.ie/2013/12/the-helgo-treasure-a-viki...

The Vikings sure travelled far and wide.

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They travelled far and wide indeed but it is also quite possible that Buddhist artifacts got in their possession via much earlier Sino-Roman trade exchange and then just happened to be in one of the cloisters which Vikings so loved to plunder.

Not necessarily, artifacts could have traveled through multiple transactions along a trade route without any single person traveling all the way. So the Buddha does not necessarily mean that a viking traveled to Asia or vice versa. Although it does show that continuous interactions happened all the way, which is itself fascinating.

That's the most probable explanation. The ancient trade routes were more A to B to C and not A going to C type affairs. The Americans has seen artifacts from the Arctic make it down to Central America, never mind the Pacific islanders.

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