As previously mentioned, we had a covid test at 1115a at the airport. The reason we had to go to the airport to begin with is because the Budget car rental office in Prague screwed up numerous things including the drop off date. So despite calling them and trying to get Budget to extend the rental, they were extremely unhelpful. As a result, we were returning the car a day early and renting a new one from Sixt just for 24 hrs. There was little signage at the airport directing us where to drop off the car. Then we had to track down the rental kiosks, which were in a completely different place at the airport. Then Sixt insisted we needed an international driver’s permit to rent the new car.
While in the past, I have gone to AAA to get one of these very dated drivers licenses, I have never actually been asked to show one. This includes renting cars in (but not limited to) the Cook Islands, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Belgium, Netherlands, Namibia, Jordan, Turkey, Croatia, Montenegro, Slovenia, Albania, Bosnia, St Maarten, France, Luxembourg, Greece, Iceland, and Costa Rica just to name a few. Not one of them has asked for an international driver’s license. The guy working at Sixt said they could still rent to me if I paid for the basic insurance coverage. Somehow this was like a “back door” to rent to Americans. It seemed like a scam, but we’d already wasted over an hour dealing with all this crap, missed our covid test, and were out of options.
The Sixt guy “upgraded” us to a Peugeot 2008 since he felt bad, which is like a compact SUV. In Europe, I don’t really care for larger cars, but I guess we will have no problem with our suitcases in the trunk. At 1230, we were finally on our way, though we weren’t entirely sure where. Eventually we formulated a plan. We would go to the Polish Aviation Museum because I’ve been a really good boy, and then we would drive back toward Auschwitz to ensure we did it properly.
Most of the aircraft were displayed outside, which in Poland is an interesting choice. That being said, it was interesting to see such relics of the Cold War and before. As a former member of the Warsaw Pact, there were numerous MiGs, Sukhois, and your occasional Tupolev or Ilyushin. It was like a petting zoo of old Soviet-built hardware. Such aircraft don’t often make it to American aviation museums, at least in large numbers.
They were lined up in such a way that it almost looked like I was sneaking onto an abandoned Air Force base from the Cold War. Most of the planes looked very “tired,” but as the saying goes, “In Soviet Poland, plane fly you.” As much as I was enjoying the petting zoo, we had to hit the road.
Our reason for returning to Auschwitz was simple. This site is far too important to short change. We had the time, and our only sacrifice was a little more time in the car. It doesn’t appear you actually need the timed tickets to enter the Birkenau site, as we did with Auschwitz I. We could see the tour groups amassing at different points, but only in the area around the train tracks and immediate vicinity.
We veered in a different direction and would ultimately walk the entire perimeter of the camp, which was miles. It is even bigger than we imagined yesterday. As many as 500 inmates could be housed in a single barrack at its worst, and there were A LOT of barracks. More than a million people died here — an unfathomable number. It helped a little when I attached a face like Anne Frank or her family to the numbers. Most women and children, or those who didn’t appear capable of useful work were immediately sent to the gas chambers.
The survivability rate if you were sent to this camp was obviously not very good. The trees you see above were like a staging area for them to be stripped before being sent into the gas chambers. On this warm sunny day, my blood ran cold thinking that these trees surrounding me were the same trees that flanked the victims in their final minutes.
As the Red Army moved in from the east, the SS guards attempted to destroy evidence of their atrocities by using dynamite to blow up the gas chambers. There was, however, one incident of revolt by Jewish prisoners who were forced to work at one of the gas chambers. They destroyed it themselves in 1944 and then attempted to escape through the wire fence. All of them were eventually captured and murdered.
Such tales of revolt were few, but a few Polish prisoners escaped while working on the drainage ditch you see above. With any glimmer of hope came reprisals. Anyone loosely connected to the handful of Poles that escaped were later hanged or shot. We also were able to walk in the building where those who were selected for work were sent.
Nicole and I were commenting to each other how if you made it there, you were “lucky,” and how sickening that statement is. Your head was shaved, your possessions taken, your arm tattooed, and your naked body paraded into different rooms for processing. An entire block of warehouses called “Canada” was dedicated to storing stolen possessions from Jewish prisoners. The scale of everything that happened in this camp is just so beyond comprehension.
Eventually we made the full circle, and encountered the remnants of the last two gas chambers. As we made our way around the camp, we encountered very few people. When we reached the very first gas chamber, Nicole had paused to read a sign in the other direction. I was alone, face to face with a building that saw the murder of hundreds of thousands of people. I then walked around a nearby pond that served as the final dumping ground for most of the ashes. It was all a bit much for me and I welcomed the sight of Nicole converging with my path once more. I apologize for all these blogs about the holocaust. I know it’s not my usual fun, witty, sarcastic fare, but Auschwitz is like a pilgrimage. We wanted to make sure we did it right, did it fully, and gave it the attention it deserves. While it is certainly the most notorious of the camps, it is but one of many, and the scale of the crimes committed still evades my comprehension. We exited the gates some hours after arriving with a sense of relief. Those that arrived on the trains certainly did not have such an easy exit.
We stopped at a Lidl on our way back to Krakow to get some pasta to make at our apartment. Being a Saturday night, we figured restaurants would be packed and a nice relaxing dinner at “home” with a bottle of wine seemed to fit the bill after another heavy day.
With tired legs and feet, we trudged through old town Krakow back to our apartment to finally relax and make some sort of vain attempt to process the day. Tomorrow we are flying to Munich (we think). We initially thought we would be flying to either Paris or Amsterdam again because those flights looked better, but things change. So if things go well, I’ll be blogging from Bavaria. If that doesn’t work out, hopefully we’ve at least left the airport. I’m kind of over the crowds in old town Krakow.
passports & pepto bismol 