Category: travel

When Annelies and I are planning our trips, we have to take a bunch of stuff into consideration. How much time we have, where we want to go, who do we want to visit, what we want to see/do, etc. We start with a broader view then narrow it down by thinking about cost, transportation logistics, whether or not there’s anything specific any of us want to see, etc.

It was Hubby Mike who expressed the desire to see a concentration camp. Annelies and I were both of the opinion that wanting to see a concentration camp felt sort of wrong. But then I read something that basically said Holocaust survivors want people to see the sites, read the books, etc. It is important to remember the atrocities.

The Holocaust should always serve as a brutal reminder of what can happen when one group of individuals stops seeing another group as human beings. Perhaps the most important reason to remember is so that the millions who suffered during this bleak time in world history did not die or suffer in vain.

I actually left it up to Hubby to choose a site or two in Germany, the Czech Republic, or Austria of interest so that Annelies and I could work one or more into our plan. We chose  Terezin (Theresienstadt), a camp-ghetto established in the town of Terezin, northwest of Prague. (Terezin was originally built in 1780 to serve as a fortress to protect Prague from invaders to the north.)

Terezin isn’t a typical concentration camp. It wasn’t equipped or used to exterminate massive numbers of Jews. It first served as a transit camp/distribution facility. Later it was used as a ghetto/labor camp and prison to hide deportees in order to help conceal their actual fate.

Jews were typically gathered in the adjacent ghetto and the ones who tried to escape or were involved in the resistance were sent to the small fortress for brutal punishment.

As you can see on this map, Terezin consisted of a ghetto in the town and a small fortress just outside of town that housed the Prague Gestapo Police Prison.

The Small Fortress was not a happy place to see, as the pics in this post will show, but it was an important place to see. The various links explain stuff better, for those who want to know more.

This is an artificial cemetery, created after liberation in 1945. There are 2,386 graves, containing the remains of about 10,000 souls (only 1,133 of the bodies buried here could be identified).

The stones placed on the headstone are not disrespectful as they may appear. According to Shiva.com…

Within the Jewish faith, it is customary to leave a small stone on the grave. The visitor positions the stone on the grave using his or her left hand. Placing a stone on the grave serves as a sign to others that someone has visited the grave. It also enables visitors to partake in the mitzvah tradition of commemorating the burial and the deceased.

The sky was fittingly somber during our visit.

Apparently that sign was common at the concentration camps, which were supposed to be labor camps, not places to facilitate the murder of hundreds upon thousands of Jews and other insurgents. It was unusual for a Gestapo prison.

The First Yard is divided into Blocks A and B, housing 17 mass cells and 20 solitary cells. Up to 1,500 inmates lived in The First Yard at any one time.

As explained in a Prague Blog I came across while preparing this post:

In the first courtyard for men, roll call took place in the morning and evening. Visitors can see 17 cells. Prisoners were separated by nationality with often 60 to 90 people per cell. Wooden planks made up bunk beds that were three tiers high. Narrow shelves held personal belongings. There was one toilet and one sink, and water had to be reused. The prisoners were not allowed to use light. There was rarely any heating, and humidity tormented the inmates during the summer. Lice and insects contributed to the bad hygiene.

Picture yourself and 59 to 89 others crammed into and living in that small space with one toilet and one sink (remember water often had to be re-used).

According to that Prague Blog I found:

During 1943 a central shower room was installed with a delousing station for clothes, where two vats or cylinders that worked on hot steam were set up. During the 10 to 12 minutes that the machines killed the insects on the clothes, up to 100 inmates were allowed to shower together. Women sometimes had hot water, but men always had cold water. Then they had to wear the wet clothes, sometimes going straight to work. The longest break between showers was four months.

This washroom was one of many tricks the Nazis used to fool the Red Cross into thinking detainees were being treated humanely.

The Mortuary is where the bodies of prisoners tortured to death  were stored.

There’s a swimming pool to the right of The Death Gate, which was built to hold water for fighting fires, but was also used by the guards and their families for bathing.

Thanks to the Prague Blog I mentioned previously for this horrific bit of info I hadn’t known before…

The fourth courtyard was built in 1943. Prisoners living there were forced to watch executions. The huge cells held from 400 to 600 people, who slept on the floors or in beds. There were two toilets in each cell and a glass roof added some light but made it hotter during the summer. During 1945 there were no showers in this courtyard, and typhus broke out.

Up to 20 people were held in each of the 125 solitary confinement cells, which did not have toilets or seating.

I wouldn’t want to be alone in that cell much less share it with up to 19 others.

I did say it wasn’t a happy place to see, right?

I am glad we did see it, though. It really IS important to remember.

I am not a typical traveler. Neither are my friends and Hubby, apparently. We don’t all go in for seeing all of the must-see sights at a particular place. We’re more amble around, take-it-all-in, see-what-you-can-see types. We travel together because we like each others’ company. We have fun together. We laugh a lot. We all like good food and drinks, too, so we tend to eat well and drink more than we probably should. Seeing cool stuff along the way is more of a bonus than the ultimate goal.

That being said, Kassel wasn’t a complete disappointment (see my previous post), it was just okay. The park and fountain were cool, but the city itself didn’t really excite us. Of course, it’s being compared to other places we visited during this particular tour, like Prague, Vienna, and Salzburg. Compared to Detroit, Kassel is awesome!

Hubby and I really enjoy seeing the old buildings in European cities. There weren’t a whole lot of old buildings in Kassel’s downtown because it was 90% destroyed by bombs in WWII. The place wasn’t as picturesque as it might have been, but there was still some interestingness to behold.

Like the Man Walking to the Sky sculpture.

There was nothing else particularly notable, just some things that caught my eye. Like these interesting buildings…

Oh, and a couple of nice shots from the park that I should have shared in yesterday’s post.

I found this weeping-type evergreen tree fascinating both for the type of tree and the amount of moss and lichen growing on the trunk and branches.

I guess Kassel is a wet place. There was lots of moss, lichen, ferns, and other shady forest-loving growths on many trees, stone walls, buildings, etc.

You may need to click on the image above for a closer look. The face jumped right out at me when I saw those rocks.

And that’s it for Kassel. Next up, the Czech Republic.

Annelies and I work together when planning joint trips like the one we just completed. She selected our first overnight destination and I approved it. We both thought it would be cooler than it actually was.

We’d both agreed that the bergpark, which was recently designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, would be a nice, relaxing place to visit. I’d assumed “bergpark” meant something like “large city park.”

I should have read more closely AND translated that particular word from German to English. As it turns out, a bergpark is a MOUNTAIN park. Mountain parks aren’t relaxing. A stroll up and down the hills of a mountain park could — and did! — make for an exhausting first day.

When I opened my eyes on Sunday, I was greeted by the scene pictured at right. We’d slept with our hotel windows wide open since there was no A/C, which is the norm at hotels in older buildings throughout Europe. It sure looked like it might be a pretty day, despite the forecast for clouds and rain.

By the time we’d finished breakfast, however, the clouds had moved in. The rain started right around the time we reached the park. We had umbrellas, rain gear, and an “it’s all part of the adventure” outlook, so we pressed on.

In the park, is a big-ass fountain — aka water feature — which dates back to the 17th century. If you’d like more details, click the image on the right.

It really is very big. Since we’d arrived early — about 40 minutes before the buses started running — we decided to start walking up the hill instead of waiting for the bus.

The hill was pretty steep. It wasn’t long before we wisely decided to descend back to the bus stop where we’d started and wait for a bus to take us to the top.

The first part of the water feature is situated at the base of the Hercules statue, which you can barely see through the clouds in the image shared above. You can see it a little better in the next shot.

There’s a palace building behind where Annelies is standing, which wasn’t all that impressive, in my opinion. But I did like the lion.

There was lots of moss and lichen throughout the park. I’ll share some pics of that in a later post.

There was a Visitors’ Center in or near the base of the Hercules statue. I never did figure out why Hercules was the figure selected to adorn the top of the mountain, but then I didn’t try very hard.

You can see that palace building I mentioned earlier in the next image.

The water feature, which I will just call a fountain from here on because it’s easier, really is quite big.

I tried to capture images that would show the scale.

Behind Annelies, toward the upper left of the image above, is where the tiered cascades start.

You know it’s a big hill when you get below the clouds as you descend!

I wasn’t impressed by the statues, which I found to be more like yard art (they are!) than museum-quality sculptures.

The water in the pools was sort of dirty, too. But then, it is recirculated through 300-year-old pipes twice every week, May through September.

Notice that the statue in the image above is a trumpeter? Remember that, okay?

We reached the pool at the bottom of the cascade, which is supposedly the best viewing spot, at least an hour, maybe more, before the water was scheduled to be released. So we decided to have lunch and/or drinks while we waited.

It was really starting to cloud-up by that point, which is why the next image is so dark and grainy.

It may have rained a bit while we enjoyed our refreshments, but we were seated under an umbrella and didn’t care. Afterward, we headed back to the pool.

We were all amazed to see how many people had shown up since we’d left the pool earlier. And there was still about 30 minutes left to wait!

Unfortunately, while we waited, rain started to pour. There may have even been some thunder. Our happy outlook was definitely starting to wane.

But we toughed it out.

Look how many people were lining the sides of the cascade. As the water started to flow, it sounded like there was an air-raid siren going off in the distance. Remember the trumpeter statue? There were at least two, and the flowing water caused their trumpets to sound!

From there, we hurried the half mile or so to the next feature, and waited through still more pouring rain for the water to flow over that waterfall.

We were all wet and not so happy by that point. But, since we’d seen everything to that point, we couldn’t very well miss the finale at the lowest pool. So, on we trudged.

We waited there at the bottom for what felt like a very long time. By that point, we were all tired, damp, thirsty, and ready to leave.

Once the water did reach the lowest pool, the sun had come back out, and the finale WAS fun to see.

You can appreciate the height of the gravity-and-water-powered fountain in the next shot, which was captured from the lawn of the palace.

It was interesting. It’s certainly the biggest yard fountain I have ever seen.

That’s how we spent the majority of our first full day of the road trip.

It could be that the gray and rainy weather dictated the mood. Or it could be that we didn’t focus on the right attractions. Maybe it’s because we were all exhausted by the end of the day from all the walking we’d done. Whatever the case, it was unanimous… Kassel Germany was our least favorite destination.

I’ll share a few more pics tomorrow. But first, below is one of my favorite photos captured during our adventure at the park.