Thursday, March 13, 2008

Wolfs Lair (Wolfsschanze)

During our trip to the Polish lake-district we paid a visit to Wolfsschanze (Wolf's Lair). Built in 1940 it was the place where Hitler spent most of the war. The site consists of a number of (huge) bunkers which were disguised from sight by trees, so could not be spotted either by road or air.

A lot of the complex was destroyed by the Germans on their retreat, but the size of the walls (and their reinforcement) meant that despite large amounts of explosives a number of the buildings still stand.

The place is also noteable as it was there that Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg attempted to assassinate Hitler (something which is now being made into a film called Valkyrie unfortunately starring Tom Cruise)

The Wolf's Lair is a huge area (around 2.5km square) and as we were the only visitors trudging round the place it was slightly eerie. We were not sure whether it was called Wolf's Lair before or after Hitler moved there - there were other towns he could have chosen nearby (one called Pish and another called Lazy) but thought perhaps that they wouldn't have given the right impression...

The bunker where the attempted assisination took place


Hitler's sauna(!)

The typing bunker


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