Day 63-64



Facing the entrance from the inside



Sunday started very early. I caught a train from Salzburg to St. Valentine at around 7 in the morning. The ride lasted around an hour or so and brought me to what I felt like was the middle of nowhere. Bad idea on my part to head to a suburban area on a Sunday. Sundays in Germany and Austria are very quiet, most (all) stores are closed and trains don't run as often as they do on weekdays. I was stuck in St. Valentine unless I wanted to take a train that would go way out of my way, lasting an hour (after I waited another hour) or I took a taxi to Mauthausen. I talked to someone who worked at the station and had him call a cab to see how much it was. Heres where I wish my German was a little better. He said it would cost me sieben und zwantzig Euros and I thought 7 Euros and 20 cents.. fail... it was 27 Euros. All the same I got to where I wanted to go. This place was Litterally in the middle of nowhere on the top of huge hill. I was in awe.





I walked in and could not believe how big the camp was.

wailing wall

Right through the gates were numerous placs along what is known as the Wailing Wall. Here prisions got a taste of the brutality to come. They were lined upand chained facing the wall and forced to stand there for hours or even days while being whipped and screamed at.

Though not all of the baracks are still in tack a few still remain for viewing. Inside I saw how the prisoners lived and also some interesting exhibts. I really liked this set up since the baracks mostly were the same, having a few used as informational areas was a great idea. The exhibits talked about stagged suicides from the electric fence that inmates were pushed into or since the fence was unmarked from the inside as electic those who ran to to excape were electricuted.

camp w/ remaining barracks

I was really freaked out inside of the barracks. I was the only one on sight beside a few French visiters. When I was inside the barracks I was all by myself and I heard the creaking of the wood as if people were still walking around inside. It didn't sound like heavy footsteps and it could've been mistaken for the moaning and grouning of the old wood but it still freaked me out. I felt very uneasy.
  

 



leading to the gas chambers

I walked into every building and got a feel for the camp. There were memorials everywhere. I was still alone and it was so quiet I felt like I was in a ghost town. Though I was really on edge I went into the cremitorium and to the execution rooms as well as the old political prison. 

camp prison

The feelings I had walking through those places are so hard to describe. I felt hollow, scared, angry and hopeless. Seeing the freezer where bodies were stored in heaps, the table where people were cut open.. it all just made me feel so empty towards humanity. It was really creepy to say the least.

close up



I

Outside the execution room I found a memorial commemorating 40 Dutch and 7 Brittish special agents who were captured and put to death in Mauthausen. Their ashes were burried by other prisioners, at the risk of their own lives. Here I felt some comfort towards humanity. It's amazing how terrible things can bring people of different backgrounds together, and the things peopel do for others even after were dead.



Cemetary errected by Americans



I also walked to the old women's quarter where inmates were brutally treated and where the sick were also housed. Here the American troops who liberated the camp dug up mass graves and gave the people a proper burial. this area was closed off but I did feel a sense of peace rather than disturbance.

Past the area where the rest of the barracks used to lay i saw where the ashes were laid from the cremitorium. It's sad to think that the people who died here never get to leave, though there is comfort that no one will forget what happened.



where the ashes were laid





 





 







 








Exhibit showing the death tolls





In the eyes of the liberator

 In the old working courters of the Nazis officals there was a massive exhibit explaining what happened at Mauthausen and its history. There were tons of pictures and many different perspectives were shown. There was a piece written by one of the generals of the US army who explained what he saw when he arrived at the camp as well as a piece that showed who was directly involved in the murders at Mauthausen.


Exhibit



Murderers are looking at You

After walking through the exhibit I walked down towards the quary where the inmates were forced to lift 5 kilo stones up and down very trecerous steps.  Along the way there were very large monuments errected by all nationalities for those who were in the camp.



memorials



 It took me so long to get to the steps i remember looking at the scenery thinking how could something so ugly happen in such a beautiful place. When I came up to the edge of the quary I was speachless. the area was unbelievable. I kept wondering and picturing what it must have looked like when during the war. I guess that's a little selfish of me to wish that some of these places were like they were during the war. Most of the camps were used by the soviets as prisioner camps after the liberation so they were changed right away and as I rationalized if it was left alone it would almost be a monument to the Nazis and Hitler's work rather than for the inmates.

Quary

I walked down the stairs with my backpack and was exhausted!! I can't even imagine walking up and down them having nothing to eat with huge stones on my back! Unbelievable to think what the human body can endure. To the left of the Quary picture was the parachute cliff. Here many suicides were staged as the guards would push inmates over the cliff walking to and from the quary. The picture below shows the cliff.







Parachuter's cliff, where inmates were pushed over





 My visit to Mauthausen was very powerful. For once I felt filled with the information shared at the camps and annoyed that I wasn't so surprised by the things I read, as I did when this topic was new to me. I think I'm starting to take a different approach to this topic and so far my interest has lead me on a very interesting path I wonder where this new turn will take me.

















 



After visiting Mauthausen I needed to figure out how to get back to the train station to get home. I would be taking another night train, which I wasn't really looking forward to. I didn't want to take a taxi so I walked down the mountain through a ghost town of a suburb and tried to get to the train station. I got lost several times and was really worried I would miss my train but luckily I gave myself more than 2 hours to find my way.  I walked along the Danube River and finally made my way back to a train station only to find that no one was there for another hour. I waited and waited and finally another traveler showed up and he helped me find my way and by his suggestion I bought a ticket to Linz rather than head back to St. Valentine since I had to change trains there any way. I made it to Linz with an hour or so to spare. Once on the train I realized that I needed to change trains in Hannover but the train I was on went to Frankfurt. A fellow passenger and I tried to see if I could get off at another stop instead of heading in the opposite direction of where I needed to go but I didn't have any luck and followed my train route as scheduled.

Monday I arrived and spent the rest of the day catching up on some much needed sleep. I changed trains 4 times that night after doing some major hiking. I guess you can say it was a very full weekend.

Tschüß!!