Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Day 2 - Dachau

On day 2 we got up in the morning and headed to the main train station. In front of the Starbucks is where the English speaking tours left from (I know so American). We went to Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial. Our tour guide was named Matt, he was from California and was working on his PhD in History, he was very knowledgeable.

Dachau was open from March 1933 - April 1945 when it was liberated by the US troops. 32,000 were there at the time of liberation. It was estimated that up to 80,000 had been there the year before.

This was a replica of the main gate as you entered. It reads "work makes you free". The Nazis not only wanted to suppress people physically, but emotionally and mentally as well. People would read this walking in thinking that if they worked hard they would be released, when in reality the harder they worked the faster they became malnourished, dehydrated and exhausted.

Dachau was a main concentration camp, meaning people would be registered here and then could be sent to one of the 123 subsidiary camps in the surrounding areas. Sometimes people would leave for just the day and return in the evening to Dachau.

The bunk houses

"The Showers" - there was never any plumbing installed, proving that they were truly built with one purpose, a gas chamber.


An estimated 250,000 people died at Dachau. 11-12 Million would die in concentration camps during WWII. 6 Million of those were of Jewish decent.

After Dachau we headed to the Hunting and Fishing Museum (I think everyone can guess which one of us wanted to go there). It was actually pretty interesting and the building was beautiful, I loved how it was all displayed.


No...don't bite! Down boy...


After that we headed to the Residenz. The Munich Residenz served as the seat of government and residence of the Bavarian dukes, electors and kings from 1508 to 1918.


I've been wanting to paint my ceiling blue...but gold applique could work too...


After the Residenz we were quite hungry so we decided to walk around and look for a good place to eat...and that's when we found the mothership...

We ended up eating at this place called Spatenhaus. We had pork and spartzels with cheese in a mushroom sauce, it was so yummy I wanted to eat it everyday!

5 comments:

Camille, Blake, Pierce and baby Asher said...

Wow... what a great day... this is awesome documentary... keep them coming you should make a book.

Jacquie Von Hohn said...

I tried to keep a journal while we were there...but it just got too hard towards the end with all the fun stuff we were doing...we didn't have any downtime to write...

Renee Westcott said...

I love the detail and the pics. It's almost like I went on vacation...at least the closest I've come to one for at least a year. Do you think we're crafty enough for gold appliqué? It would fun.

APage said...

That's AWESOME!!! The pics are all so beautiful and you two look GREAT!

Anonymous said...

Make sure you have all your facts and accurate and please watch your spelling!!!!!!!!! You can come across as ignorant.....just some friendly advice!