Auschwitz 1

Said good bye to my dad yesterday.

I had a long 600 mile day but pretty uneventful. Traveled across Germany on A4 and then part way across Poland.

Got to Auschwitz early, 8 in the morning. I read online its best to go through with our a guide if you want to spend the time to see things and not be pushed through.

I learned first thing there is actually 2 camps, there were more but 2 were turned into memorials/museums

I showed up at Birkenau first and was told it would be better to see Auschwitz before so I went the 3km to the original camp

Birkenau gate 

I made it to the original Auschwitz camp and it was already fairly busy, or so I thought.....

The gate with the infamous Arbeit Macht Frei "work makes you free" 

Some photos of the barracks in Auschwitz 

here was one barrack full of things taken from the people coming in. 

This was in the basement of the cellblock building, for people who broke the rules. They would put people in these small cells with no ventilation and as they breathed they used the oxygen and eventually died. 

The off color wall in front of this picture was where they would line people up and shoot them. When I arrived these boyscouts were all singing something, I couldnt understand. The feeling in the are was intense. To hear this somber song sung in remembrance of the people who suffered here was unreal. 

This was inside one of the first gas chambers they built to try. 

Furnaces 

Looking into the camp 

All in all the Auschwitz 1 camp was really very well done. If I were to do it again I would like to get a guide one day then come back early in the morning on my own to go through it. I was there almost 3 hours and when I was leaving it was packed with people waiting to come in. The guided tours I passed sounded interesting with personal stories but the guides were pushing people through as quickly as possible. Most of the barracks have some sort of display in them and other than the 3 or 4 with the main display nobody visited the others.