Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Ahh…. Another beautiful day.
Destination? Drive 134 miles to
Villach. But we first take our RV’s and
drive a short, very steep road to the parking lot of Adolph Hitler’s mountain retreat.
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| High up on the hill was Hilter's retreat " Eagles Nest" it is no wonder why he felt vulnerable! |
When we looked high up among the clouds, we saw a tiny building on the very top of a rocky ledge in the
middle of the Bavarian Alps in Germany- Hitler’s Eagles Nest. This property came
under the control of a Tourist office in 1960, and is leased out as a cozy restaurant.
All proceeds go to charity.
Since the road was closed to the public in 1952, great big
tandem busses carried us up the mountain, 2300 feet of elevation gain over the
next 4 miles. This road is one of its
kind; having been blasted completely out of the mountain over a mere 13 months!
We then walked 406 feet through a tunnel where we entered a
huge brass trimmed elevator carrying us up another 406 feet in 41 seconds. Blink, and the elevators opened up to vast
views of the mountain ranges. The temperature, for being so high up, was glorious! We could see for what seemed, a 100
miles. The clouds and fog below us crept
in and out along the river. Birds soared
as busloads of tourists competed for the best vantage spot for that all
important “selfie”.
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| Our view from on top of the mountain a little above The Eagle's Nest |
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| Here we could see the fog retreat on the lake |
The house is designed with a pseudo-medieval look with thick
granite walls and heavily beamed ceilings. Adolph did not like to come here
fearing its vulnerability to attack, and so it was used mostly by his mistress,
Eva Braun. We viewed an elaborate Bunker
system that had multiple levels, which were lined with concrete and bricks. It had power, heating and ventilation systems
as well as a very elaborate anti-gas protection system.
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| This is part of the elaborate bunker system below the Eagle's Nest. The steel and concrete buffer was designed to protect persons from shock waves and explosion shrapnel. As an air landing by Allied paratroopers was feared, all entrances were protected with machine gun emplacements. |
The group had lunch and perhaps a quick nap before we headed
down the mountain and off to our campsite in Villach.
The
snack table at cocktail hour today was particularly good since we had just
stopped at a discount supermarket down the road. It didn’t have much “dinner” foods, but there
were many cheeses and cured meats (bologna and sausage, etc) beer and
wine.
There was venison on the menu here at the campground
restaurant, so Norm and I plus a few others decided to partake, but our meals
were all pretty bad. Mine, because I
could not have the “bread balls”, consisted of two tiny venison meatloaf slices,
a sea of gravy and French fries!
Yuck!
Tomorrow we will be in Italy, and the food there should be
incredible! I tried all night to get
online, but again no luck!
