Mauthausen

The walls of Mauthhausen

Trains carrying prisoners entered this gate

Barracks filled to overflow in 44

The quarry, now overgrown

Thick walls

A happier scene of Grein

Hugh and deborah, Grein in the background

Drew is a retired cardiac surgeon, he likes to get up early and he really does not want to wait. The night before we had managed to activate our iphones, he had been terribly lost at being disconnected. We both bought plans with substantial data and some talk for about 30 euro, try that in Canada!

My phone rang at 7 am, even though we had agreed to leave at 0830, he was already in the restaurant. Naturally Deborah and I speeded up, we could not contact the McGuire’s as his phone is Canadian and our Austrian plan does not include long distance. On the agenda was a long ride; we estimated 60 km, and a climb to the infamous Mauthausen concentration camp. Drew and I fetched the bikes from the parkade, and in fact we left at 0830 precisely. The path out of town retraced the tramlines but traffic was light and we progressed well. It was 25 km to the camp, a nice journey save a difficult climb of about 1 km and 800 feet. We all pushed our bikes.

We arrived at about 11 am, the photos tell part of the story: A rock quarry where prisoners worked 7 days a week, on 660 calories per day under horrific conditions. The construction company that built the camp was owned by the SS, the materials and labour to build the camp were all from slaves. The kill rate was remarkable, most died from malnutrition, and exposure, many were murdered and tortured to death. The death toll over 4 years was greater than 100,000, over ½ of the victims in the last 4 months of the war. The camp was liberated by the 65 Th infantry of the US army and in fact many liberated inmates died of overfeeding within weeks!

Having visited the SS and Gestapo museum last year in Berlin, I am sensitive if not more emotionally affected by these stories than history classes allow. I was glad to leave. We were however delayed as Deborah and Carol read every signpost. Drew was incredulous about the time they were taking considering shopping was not involved.

I won 5.00 euro from the Pope for the over and under bet as to when they would reappear. God he hates to lose.

The trip down the hill more than made up for the climb.

There were a few detours as a result of the flooding and each time we took a reading we seemed as far away from Grein (our destination) as the previous 30 mins. At mid afternoon we decided to investigate a Celtic village near Mitterkirchen. Somehow we lost Drew, thankfully our Austrian phones worked and in fact we knew where the other was thanks to an App, “find friends”.

Drew has had a premonition that things were not right with the tour, he had booked after us and so was a sort of add on. We finally made our way in Grein, a beautiful setting! We were at separate hotels and we separated. An hour after we checked in I called Drew, after a few rings his breathless voice answered. He was making his way up an incredible grade to a hotel 7 km out of town!! No one knew this was the deal. He turned around and our hotel called his and arranged a ride for him, the bike was left with us. After the longest ride of the trip (70 km), this adversity was most unwelcome.

Fortunately his hotel was spa like, with a pool and good restaurant. We would reconvene in the am; the ride to Melk was only 44 km.