Former bunker of the German governement staff

Saturday morning, it was a sunny and warm day, one of the first in this spring. Got up at 7am , boarded the train at 8 and met my dear friend jselzer at the Bonn main station at 10 am. After struggling with the ticket machine for nearly 15 minutes, we boarded the train to Ahrweiler in the neighbour province. After approximately 40 minutes of travel along the Rhine, with a beautiful view on the landscape and the river, we arrived in the middle of nowhere, next to Ahrweiler. We found a little sign, showing the way to the bunker and followed it. And followed and followed… after 2 signs, we entered a little path leading upwards a little mountain and we found another 2 signs along the way, leading though a forest with suprisingly many people ahead. After another 5 Minutes of walking, we finally reached the entrance of the “regbu”. Hard to see from most sides, just a little building, not bigger than a row house sized for one family and a big tunnel entrace a little below.

After approximately 10 minutes of waiting, the next tour started with about 20 people and a guide who might grow too old for that job in the near future. Maybe he already was. He told alot facts about the bunker, which was build in the late 60′s out of an old railway tunnel. Soon turned out, that only the entrance was intact, and had partly been rebuilt. Most of the Bunkers inner rooms and facilities, which had originally been over 3 kilometers in the whole length, were not longer inside the the old railway tunnel. The picture on the left shows a lighted view inside the tunnel where the visitors area ended.

But the part that could be visited had been restored with alot of detail and quality. It was really great to see how such a big
facility had been controlled in these days. You can see a picture of the control panels on the side of this article. It was lighted, and just connected for show purposes, so that the visitors were allowed to press the buttons and look how the lights changed on the statuses of the many different doors. The were some rooms, intact, like toilets, bedrooms, and showers for decontamination. All of them looked exactly like those in my old highschool. Seems they haven’t been changed since the school (and the bunker) had been built. We also visited the caffetieria, which lacked the furniture but was filled with pictures and things from the original bunker.

The interesting and depressing part of the bunker visit was the fact, that the bunker was never fit to protect the people inside, or get them inside in time, but costed 2 billion “deutsche Mark” and had been built, more or less to “have one”, because all the others had one. The really impressive pictures and thick walls, doors and expensive equipment, triggered a few bad feelings and thoughts about mankind, governements and how they tend to kill each other instead of working together, making the world a better place and leading mankind to the future.

In the end it was a really great day, ending with a nice walk after the visit in the mountains surrounding and sitting with jselzer in the sun talking about life. We also visited Ahrweiler for a short time and traveled back to Bonn in the afternoon. I recommend to all interested persons, to visit the bunker themselves, the impressions and the storys are totally worth it. Prices, pics and how to find it, are listed on the website.