Scroll down for Polish text -|- Polski tekst poniżej

The German concentration camp Auschwitz is visited by more than one million people from all over the world each year. With this geocache we want to show you a place which is really close by, but not seen by many.

The cache is located at the end of the railway siding which was used to transport prisoners to the camp. The end of the railway usually also meant the end of their lives.

Please stop for a moment and try to visualize the following picture: the whole area surrounded by armed German soldiers with dogs, after a couple days spent in cattle cars, with no food nor water, the prisoners leave the train being on their last legs. Some of them still think it is just a camp, not a death factory. Usually already at the siding there was a selection going on. The old, weak and sick went straight to the gas chambers, the stronger ones were left alive to be used as slave work force in one of German factories close by.

This single rail siding had very limited capacity, only a few trains per day could be processed. That is why the nearby camp Birkenau has no less than 3 sidings to allow the German death factory to work as efficiently as possible.

The green area SE from you is the Sola river, it was the favorite recreation place for German soldiers and employees of the camp. You can walk from here to the twin cache Auschwitz - The forgotten cemetery. If you take the route along the Sola river, at the Legionów street 88 you can find the former villa of Rudolf Höss, the commandant of Auschwitz concentration camp. Please don't bother the people living there now, they have nothing in common with nazis.

There are multiple Auschwitz museum parkings around, however if you want to stop really close to the cache, you can park (at your own risk) for a short time at N 50° 01.473 E 019° 12.124. Do not park at the bus terminus at the other side of the street.

You don't have to dig, nor to climb anywhere. Pretend to be a nosey tourist trying to find a good perspective for pictures. Be careful when crossing the street, if you want you can walk along the railway. Please obfuscate the cache very little. It has to be easy to find, but not stand out.