Sleep

Date: 30th Jan

I've still got the last week or so of entries to post, they're all sitting as drafts in the queue, but a quick update - I'm alive, I'm in London, today was the last day of the bus tour. Very enjoyable trip, more to come later.

Where were we? Oh yes, Dresden

As the bus trip moves into its final few days it becomes harder to keep up, both with the journal and the trip.

Date: 26th Jan

Dresdon, was not has hard as Auswitch, but that's more to do with how the place is portrayed today. What's left of the war is new buildings replacing those destroyed and many older buildings with blacken bricks, or white bricks - the white because they were replaced in the rebuild having been destroyed in the bombing.

Whilst the image today is a mixture of modern and classical, looking figuratively below the surface, the true horror becomes apparent. This city represents the most devestating single event of the war.

With the Soviets approaching from the East, and the Allied forces sweeping in from the West, the Germans had all but abandoned this beautiful city, known in its day as the Florence on the Elbe. The city had remained largely untouched in the war, it was at worst a war machinery factory, a staging area, a communications hub, or a hospital, depending on whom you believe. Eyewitnesses differ.

Having the Reich on the back foot, Churchhill wanted a decisive blow to seal the win. 

With the war approaching on both sides, and the Nazi propaganda having German civilians believing the Red Army as some barbaric race, the refugees poured into Dresden. An official population of some 642,000 was increased by an estimated refugee population of between 150,000 and 200,000. 

On the night of the 13th of February, the RAF launched the first of a series of raids targeting the central city. The initial attack started in the late evening targeting, the second to follow up 4 hours later in hopes of catching the firefighters and other rescuers. The central city was targeted rather than the outerlying industrial suburbs housing the German war manufacturing because it was felt it would be more devestating targeting the city.  

The bombers began dropping their payloads at around 2130hrs, the exact, or even estimated amount of explosives dropped is varied in its reporting but they did drop a mixture of high explosive bombs and incendiary bombs. It was the latter that caused the firestorm.

As the fire began to spread, it sucked in more air from outside the city fuelling it further, until it Kurt Vonneguts words, "turned the city into a single column of flame". The now self sustaining firestorm rapidly spread through the central city population reaching temperatures exceeding an estimated 1500°C and combined with the high explosives destroying or damaging a huge number of buildings. In the 4 days of bombings 24,800 out of 28,400 houses in the central city were destroyed. An area of 15 square kilometres totally levelled, 72 schools, and 22 hospitals. The majority of the industry and manufacturing plants in the outer suburbs were largely unaffected. 

The number of bombs dropped was estimated at 600,000. Almost one bomb for every man, woman, and child.

This wasn't a strategic surgical attack - it was a holocost. 25,000 civilians died in the attack. 

Current Date: 28th Jan, 0943h

War Crime Charges over Dresden: 0. 

History is written by the conquerors.

 

Auschwitz

The scale of the war crime that was committed there. Read all the stats you want, but when you walk into the room with the hair.

I'm not ashamed to say I couldn't make it. I noped the fuck out of there, didn't finish the tour.

There's no photos for this one. The memories I'll be stuck with are all that I can handle taking from this place.

Words fail me.

Where was God at Auschwitz?

Kraków

Day 2 in Kraków featured a tour of the most important salt mines for Poland. Whilst I wasn't sure I'd enjoy it that much, I found it quite fascinating. I guess since I knew next to nothing about salt mining it really couldn't have done anything but increase my knowledge.

The miners would carve rooms, sculptures, monuments and even churches in the rock salt, it was quite impressive.

We walked down 135m deep, where it was a balmy 16°C, compared to the surface at -14°C! The elevator ride up was quick and it was really fascinating to feel the temperature drop so quickly!

Some of our numbers had a history of claustrophobia, but all did well. The elevator up was a little interesting, but I won't make any further comment on it, the tour was more than worth the ride up. I was, as ever, looking out for those people. I can't help but watch out for trouble, and as I mentioned, there were a number of pale faces at the bottom of the stairs down. I'm impressed that these people who knew they might have problems faced their fear head on - I guess I have to give the Aussies credit for something :-D

Next up I've got free time to walk around and explore, but first up was rectifying a small currency mistake, an order of magnitude more Zloti (local currency) than intended, as well as the same mistake in Budapest meant i was carry currency that was becoming less and less valuable the further we traveled. Fortunately I found a reasonable currency exchange that wasn't charging a huge percentage and converted it back to euros, a slightly more useful currency for the trip.

Tonight will be another traditional Polish dinner. Oh, I didn't mention that last night I had spinach pancakes, which sounds weird, but looked nothing like pancakes I know, and was *really* delicious!

Location: A cafe in Kraków, eating lunch

Time: 1417h

Temperature: -15°C

Road Day - Poland

Ugh, it's only been a week since the last long leg, but I'd already forgotten how it feels. We get toilet breaks every two hours, and a lunch stop, but it's still a drag.

We're on our way to Karkow, Poland.

Current Location: Jabłonka, Poland

Time: 1435h

Temperature: -4°C

Budapest

Date: 22nd Jan

On the way to Budapest we stopped in Bratislava for lunch, a small town with, what I remember as, having a lot of history. 

I have to confess I've been really slack in keeping this journal up to date, and I wanted to do so. Budapest involved a driving tour the first day, followed by free time the next day.

Budapest looks like a cross between my imagination of Soviet era buildings and beautiful historic buildings. Budapest has an unfortunate history of being occupied as well as some unfortunate incidents of their own.

Current Location: Göd (Just outside of Budapest)

Temperature: -10°C

Time: 0834, 22nd Jan

Vienna, Austria

Date: 19th Jan

Vienna was just an overnight stop unfortunately. We only had a few hours for walking around the city until the Orchestra. The orchestra was good, a smaller affair, and played classical musical with a light hearted bend. I enjoyed using my "formal wear" bag, just a jacket, shirt and shoes. It takes up a huge volume of space in my pack, and not an insignificant weight, but it's nice to have something dressy to wear.

The city of Vienna was beautiful, with a huge number of beautiful and historic buildings. 

I hope to return to Vienna for another couple of days later in my trip.