The Wolf's Lair

We had wanted to visit the Wolf’s Lair for a long time. When we were planning a summer holiday trip to eastern Poland, we finally decided to go there.

We like fortifications, which you probably already know from previous posts. The Wolf’s Lair (in German: Wolfsschanze) is the former headquarters of Hitler and the High Command of the Armed Forces. It was a small town camouflaged in a forest. Hitler was stationed here in 1941-1944. He had 8 main headquarters during WWII, but he spent the most time here, about 800 days.

The Wolf's Lair consisted of 200 buildings: some huge reinforced-concrete bunkers, smaller brick buildings and wooden barracks, shelters, warehouses, 2 airfields, a power station, a railway station, air conditioning, water supply, heating plants and two teleprinter exchanges. A railway line ran through the middle of the complex. The whole area covered about 250 ha and was surrounded by barbed wire and a minefield. You could enter the complex through three guardhouses. Inside, there were three separate security zones, and zones I and II were additionally enclosed by a 2-meter-high barbed wire fence. The staff numbered 2,200 people.

Today, it is mostly ruins. The wooden houses and barracks have fallen apart. Some of the brick buildings are basically skeletons (walls and roof) in a heavily destroyed state (mold on the ceiling and walls). Most bunkers were blown up, and only here and there are there openings through which you can get inside. For safety reasons, each structure has a sign saying that entering is dangerous. So you explore at your own risk. In one of the bunkers there was a wooden barrier that blocked the entrance. The other structures were open for exploration.

How to explore the Wolf's Lair?

First, you need to get to Gierłoż near Kętrzyn. Signposts lead you to the site itself (we saw the first ones before Kętrzyn). On site, a group of attendants directed cars to the parking lot. At the entrance they charged a parking fee and sold tickets at the same time. We drove to the parking lot and left the car. The car park was quite crowded.

We decided to look for a guide and find out how tours work here. And here we found a big disappointment. Our idea was completely different from what we found. There were guides, but you had to hire one for PLN 70. For larger groups of tourists it makes sense. For one family - the price was too high. Guides led groups in Polish, English, German, Russian, and French. We decided to explore on our own. Why isn't a guide included in the ticket price? Why are there no scheduled tours? Strange.

At the entrance there is a map of the whole area with a legend showing the buildings. The buildings are marked with painted numbers you can find on the map. If anyone is curious whether you get anything for the ticket price at the entrance - the answer is no. No leaflets, maps, or anything besides the receipt. It looks poor. The only way to have a map with you is to take a photo of the plan at the entrance. You can also buy one of the many books and maps in the kiosk. Commerce everywhere.

Sightseeing the way we had chosen had its advantages. We visited everything at our own pace, and at most buildings we found a group with a guide and could overhear for a moment what the guide was saying. We also saw what interested us most: the bunker interiors (places where a guide would never take you).

At the Wolf's Lair, important decisions were taken about the course of World War II. The most important event that took place here was the failed attempt on Hitler’s life by Claus von Stauffenberg on 20 July 1944. You can see details about this attack in the movie Valkyrie, which takes its name from the codename of the action. We have seen this movie and recommend it to everyone. Along the route there are information boards with a detailed description of this day, hour by hour. Who knows, maybe if this attack had been successful, WWII would have ended much earlier?

The tour follows colored routes. The red trail (longer) leads around all objects, and the yellow trail (shorter) covers just selected ones. We went on the longer one.

The area around the Wolf’s Lair during the war was surrounded by a minefield. This field was 100 m wide and 10 km long. The mine density was so high that no one could walk 100 m without hitting a mine. There were anti-personnel and anti-tank mines, and some of them were impossible to disarm, and there were also those hidden in glass containers, which were not detected by sappers' devices. The area was repeatedly demined. Soviet sappers started the first clearing work in 1945, right after taking the area. Interestingly, no mines were found inside the Wolf's Lair. The mines were hidden in tall grass and bushes, and the area was also guarded by machine guns and gun turrets. An enemy attack was practically impossible. Immediately after the war it was more important to demine fields and factories, so Polish sappers cleared the Wolf's Lair in stages, in 1945-1947 and 1950-1955. Arable land was cleared of mines using a driverless tractor to plow the fields. There is a commemorative plaque with dummy mines, placed in 2003 in memory of the sappers who died during the mine clearance. Kris was most interested in the mines around the site and tried to grasp the scale of the whole operation.

The Wolf's Lair was destroyed by the Germans themselves. Hitler left it for the last time on 20 November 1944, and on the night of 24 to 25 January 1945 German sappers blew up the bunkers so that they would not fall into the hands of the Red Army, which took over the abandoned site on 27 January. The explosions were so strong that concrete blocks flew into the air to a height of 20-30 m. Apparently, witnesses say that the force of the explosions was so great that ice on nearby lakes cracked. For the demolition of one bunker, about 8 tons of TNT were used.

This area was looted after the war by the local population, who used whatever they could for their own economic purposes.

To sum up: it is a shame that the site is not used in a better way. The places that were not blown up could be reconstructed in wartime style and filled with exhibits of that time. Surely it would be better for the imagination, especially for children. None of the structures had lighting, and none were officially open to the public.

Good to know: since 2017, the site has been run directly by the Srokowo Forest District (State Forests). In June 2020, a permanent exhibition opened in the former Keitel bunker with a reconstruction of the briefing room where the bomb exploded on 20 July 1944. It includes a large oak table, a briefcase with the bomb and old maps, so today it is much easier for children to imagine that day.

We can compare the exploration of this place to our visit to the Międzyrzecz Fortified Region, where a small part of the facility was restored for tourist purposes.

Tips: If you visit with children, it is best to go in a larger group (e.g. with relatives), because then hiring a guide pays off. Plan at least an hour for the visit, and 2-3 hours with a guide who tells the story of every building.

Before your visit, it is worth watching the movie Valkyrie.

Walking through the Wolf's Lair is a walk in the woods. Even on hot days it is not too warm here, and inside the bunkers it is pleasantly cool. There can be mosquitoes, so bring some insect repellent. The paths between the bunkers are fine for strollers, although here and there you can find protruding roots (an all-terrain stroller would help).

We invite you to watch a short video from our visit: