Time for our History Lesson

After an early morning hotel breakfast, the Liebsch’s took the train to Dachau Concentration Camp, located about 20 minutes outside of Munich. It was a somber experience as we spent two hours with a tour guide and learned so much about Hitler and the Third Reich. This camp was originally established as a camp for political prisoners and later served as a model for later concentration camps. Besides the grounds of the pictures, it brought life at the camp to reality when we saw pictures taken by the American troops when the survivors were liberated on April 29, 1945. You can see the relief in the faces of the prisoners and could start to imagine how hard life must have been. The history lessons that both my parents and I have had appeared more vivid during this experience. This picture was taken on the way to the crematorium. You can see the barbed wire with the ditch separating the camp form the fence to the outside world. In the background, you can see the foundations where the barricks or blocks once stood.

We continued our history experiences later that afternoon when we returned to Munich and took a two hour walking tour of the spots in Munich where Adolf Hitler gained his power and formed the Nazi party. There are no longer any visible signs of the Nazi party in Munich unless you know where to look. Our tour guide pointed out that on the ceiling of the famous beer hall where Hitler made many speeches you can see swastica's - either painted their intentionally or unintentionally.

After all of the touring and history lessons, we walked our way back to the infamous Hofbräuhaus – the beer hall of all beer halls. We ordered sausages, kraut and potatoes, pretzels along with three one-liter steins of beer. The German polka music and the festive people around us made for some genuine fun.