All smiles after a great traditional German meal.
These boys wear traditional German clothing and perform a traditional slap dance. 
Amy continuing to smile beside an icy minature waterfall...I talked Jason into this frigid hike after all.
As you can see, by the time we hiked back out, it was getting dark and colder. The seat heaters in the car were put to good use!
On Christmas Eve we ate at one of the restaurants at the hotel (Pullman's Place). They have yummy crab cakes. Then we went to the candlelight service at the chapel. Later in the evening we met up with some friends in the lobby where we finally finagled our way into rocking chairs by the fireplace.
Our reservations for Christmas dinner weren't until 4:30. So, we decided to be lazy Christmas morning. We watched White Christmas and The Santa Clause and The Grinch. The Christmas buffet turned out to be great...and I'm not much of a fan of buffets. After we all got stuffed ("we" being me, Jason, and some friends from Ramstein) we all headed to the out door hot tub (in 20 degree weather). The most amazing thing was that it SNOWED on us while we were in the hot tub. Crazy fun! Then, we wound out the day by sitting in the upstairs lobby playing games. Perfect and low key with friends. 
Arbeit Macht Frei is a German phrase meaning "Work brings freedom." Although technically, this was a work camp. It did not bring freedom for those enslaved here. 2/3 of all prisoners at Dachau were political prisoners.
Compare the bunks at Dachau to the bunks below at Auschwitz. At Dachau, the beds had dividers, laders, and a shelf for personal belongings. By no means "plush" but also not as meager as conditions became as the war progressed.
No original dorms remain. There are two dorm reconstructions. Each gravel area is where a dorm would have stood.
Fortification...although our guide said it was not needed. The prisoners were so malnurished or diseased that they could not escape. Prisoners that did cross the revine did so to thrust themselves on the electric fence in order to commit suicide. 
The crematorium and gas chamber
Brausebad is the German word for shower. (It is no longer used out of reverance for those killed in the gas chambers by the Nazis.) This is the entrance to the gas chamber at Dachau. However, this gas chamber was never used. By the time it was installed, the Nazis were being bombed heavily in this area. All Dachau prisoners that were to be murdered were put on a train and sent to an extermination camp. Our tour guide was emphatic that there is NO evidence that this gas chamber was ever used.
Inside the gas chamber (that was not used)
The crematorium, however, was used. According to our guide, it was used non-stop, until the Germans ran out of coal and could no longer cremate. Many prisoners did die at Dachau. Their deaths were due to malnutrition, disease, and suicide. Because the Germans ran out of coal, bodies began to pile up, unable to be creamated.
I think this memorial summarizes what everyone who visits this site feels:
"Never again"
AUSCHWITZ BIRKENAU CONCENTRATION CAMP 1940-1945
Jason and I visited Auschwitz in November 2007. Even though these are old pictures, I wanted to post them along with the pictures of Dachua b/c it truly paints a picture of how horrendous this period of history was.
Again...Arbeit Macht Frei is a German phrase meaning "Work brings freedom." Whereas some camps were work camps. This camp was not. It was an extermination camp. Work would set no one free here.
The train tracks that prisoners arrived on...not knowing their fate.
The buildings at Auschwitz were brick. But soon, the Nazis realized they needed much more space for prisoners.
Birkenau was established as a satelite camp. Because construction was much quicker, all dorms at Birkenau were built of wood. The accomodations at Auschwitz were awful. Those at Birkenau took awful to an all new low. Both Auschwitz and Birkenau remained overcrowded even after liberation. 
Dachau almost looks good compared to these. But none of what the Nazis did in these concentration camps was good. It is unthinkable to make human beings live in these conditions.
PROOFS OF CRIMES
This is the area of the memorial that provides "proof" of what truly happened during the Nazi reign.
They had been put on trains, told they were being moved to a new home. Each family packed what they needed for their "move." Upon arrival everything was taken from them as they were herded into hell on earth. These are some of the hundreds of suitcases taken...never to be unpacked by the owners.
Shoes longing for someone to wear them.
Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that some prisoners couldn't see what lied ahead of them.
But the most horrendous to me was the hair. Every female's head was shaved immediatly upon arrival. The hair was used for Nazi projects (sewing in particular). How sad that they felt they needed to degrade human life to that point.
But the main objective of Auschwitz was mass murder. This is one of the original rooms used for "washing up" the prisoners (which just mean stripping them of their clothes) before taking them to the gas chambers.
These are the reminants of the gas chamber that was being used 24 hours a day for mass murder prior to the camp's liberation. The Nazi's realized that the camps would soon be liberated and set out to destroy any evidence of the crimes they were committing.
"For ever let this place be a cry of despair and a warning to humanity where the Nazis murdered about one and a half million men, women, and children mainly jews from various countries of Europe." 
