Dachau Memorial Site Tour

A 4 hour fully guided tour (6 hours including transportation) to the Dachau Memorial Site. Dachau was the first permanent camp built by the Nazi Party. It opened on March 22nd, 1933, only 2 months after Adolf Hitler’s rise to power and liberated on April 29th, 1945. The site is one of the most well preserved former camps in Europe today. Our highly experienced guides discuss all aspects of camp life and death for the hundreds of thousands of prisoners that passed through the gates between 1933 and 1945. Although the camp was liberated 70 years ago, the history we can learn from Dachau is very relevant to the world around us today. Visiting a former Nazi Concentration Camp is one of the most important things to do on a trip around Europe and by far the most important thing to do in Munich. Dachau’s accessibility and importance as a center for education and reconciliation make it a day that is impossible to forget for a very long time. Dachau was the only Concentration Camp to have existed for the full 12 years of Hitler’s dictatorship. In the minds of the Nazis, it was by far the most important camp within their system and became the model for all others that followed. Below are some of the many themes and locations we will discuss & visit on this important sightseeing tour. - Origins- How the first permanent camp came to exist. Overview of the full history of the site. - Jourhaus- The entrance building & gateway into the camp, how prisoners arrive & their first experiences. - Appellplatz- the Roll Call Square, a place of humiliation, despair & punishment. - Memorial Site Museum- a Former Maintenance Building, now holding an extensive museum with many photographs, original objects & testimonies from surviving prisoners. - Torture and Punishment- Physical and Psychological torture & its impact on daily life. - The Bunker- A prison within the camp itself & the execution courtyard. - Barracks- Prisoner life & daily routine. - Perimeter Fence -Guard Towers & the electric fence. - Barrack X- The Crematoriums, mass graves, and the Gas Chamber. - International Memorial- Nandor Glid Sculpture & Religious Memorials.