The 1963 blockbuster film, The Great Escape, has become one of the iconic films with names such as Sir Richard Attenborough and Steve McQueen and many other famous actors re-enacting the famous World War II escape from Stalag Luft 3 in Zagan, then in Germany but now in Poland. The film contained extras which did not happen during the real escape and it was therefore a great source of pride to me to visit the real camp in late October 2024.
It had been a trip which was a long time in coming. I was booked to go in 2020 but the coronavirus put paid to that. Twice. I had been in touch then with the chap running the museum, Marek Lazarz, who had been unfailingly helpful during our regular correspondence. Poor chap must have had easier visitors than me considering the number of times I wrote but, before I even embark upon writing about my two-hour visit, let me say that for anyone interested in this historical feat, do make the effort to visit. I went along thinking that I knew quite a good deal about the story but came away infinitely wiser. No question was too dim or stumped Marek and I would wholeheartedly recommend that anyone visiting book in with him. I paid just 30 euros - don't make the mistake I made, though, as the Zloty is the ideal currency to take although they can take Euros - which included the entrance ticket and tour. He also picked me up from the Railway Station. Twice, but more of that in due course.
My trip was a quick one and involved just two nights in Berlin. I flew on British Airways from Heathrow on a Tuesday at 12:35 p.m. after quite an epic journey from our village in Wiltshire. An early bus was followed by a slightly delayed train to Reading after which the best Elizabeth Line connection to Slough was cancelled meaning a half-hour delay. A further bus to Terminal 5 meant that the wait was not quite as long as it might have been but it did allow me to do one chore with my Oyster card but not the second of visiting Turkish Airlines with a query about my next trip in a few weeks time. The flight was on time and all went smoothly.

A feather in my cap was comfortably booking my rail passage the following day to Zagan at the Brandenburg Airport. One person only was allowed into the one-man- staffed office and the previous visitor, I noticed, had booked his ticket and had been asked to produce his passport. I was chuffed to order my ticket in German, understood every question asked of me and the ticket seller understood all of my responses. No passport required either. The fare of 45 euros return involved a journey time in each direction of around two hours and 45 minutes with a change in Cottbus. Don't, though, forget, if you have a British passport, to take it on the journey, if travelling as I was, from Germany to Poland.
I had coped with buying the ticket from the airport to central Berlin (4.40 euros) by ticket machine. It was nice staying in central Berlin, a city I always enjoy and find fascinating. I put up in the Arte Luise Kunsthotel, a type of Art Nouveau hotel with all number of quirky exhibits just a short walk from Berlin's Friedrichstrasse Station. My room, like, I suspect, others on the third floor, was basic with showers along the corridor but the hotel's location made it easy to visit many of Berlin's highlights with just a short walk. The room was interesting too: a red wooden horse's head on the left-hand side and, well, its rear on the right... My height meant that I quite often hit my head on its hoof. Bearing in mind how central the Arte Luise is and that it is by a railway bridge, it was still very quiet although ear plugs were provided. It bothered me that central Berlin, like central Vienna where I stayed three or four years ago, could be so much quieter with traffic noise than our village.
After a decent meal in the Friedrichstrasse Station, it was lovely to be able to walk around and visit the parliament building, the Reichstag. It is an impressive building and reminds me of my schooldays and learning about Germany in the 1930s. It must have made an impression. A short walk away is the famous Brandenburg Gate. I have mentioned in my holiday ramblings on this website of the time my parents and I went from West to East Berlin in a service vehicle: I was the guilty party in delaying the transportation by writhing around on the floor when numbers were being checked. Later on, I waved at a Russian guard when aboard a train and was waved back at by the said guard as the train was leaving. I should add that I was about five or six at the time. My mother still remembers the Brandenburg Gate. It was again nice to walk down the wide avenue, Unter den Linden, and admire the illuminated monument.
I thought that I might be able to continue to Checkpoint Charlie that same evening but came across the Topography of Terrors, an exhibition of, by its name, all things bad in the city and country during the last century. Seeing part of the wall was also a bonus.

As I mentioned above, visiting Zagan by train means a change in Cottbus but with just a nine-minute connection if going early in the day. Miss the onward train and there is a further three-hour wait at Cottbus so I decided to take an earlier connection from Friedrichstrasse which would give a more comfortable changeover. Well, should have: sadly, just as travellers thought that it was arriving, the screen suddenly had no mention of the train and it transpired that it was delayed by some forty-five minutes. It meant rather hoping that the later train with the short connection would make it on time. It did, and I was able to make the Zagan train. The only issue thereafter was that the train was held up at the penultimate station, Zary, for almost half-an-hour. No announcements were given and, yes, when we arrived, I could not find Marek who, understandably, would have had to return to the museum.
I had read of the back entrance/exit to the station (via an air-raid shelter) so went through there and tried to remember the directions to reach the camp through the woods. It was said that the escapers became lost trying to reach the station and, yes, I inevitably became lost trying to do the same route in reverse... After my telephone eventually picked up a signal and I was able to call Marek, he very kindly returned to the station to collect me.

Marek showed me around the excellent museum. I am not one to watch a lot of television but, on a visit to my aunt and uncle, they put on an episode of The Grand Tour which saw Clarkson and Hammond given a tour of Stalag Luft 3. It put the bit between my teeth and I asked Marek whether he had indeed been the guide. He was, so I booked. Marek's knowledge on the subject - from the position of microphones to pick up the sound of tunnelling, the colour of the sand to the number of prisoners (and nationalities) in each camp - is remarkable and I learnt very much more than I have from books. No question was too trivial and it was equally fascinating to learn that the museum has seen up to 21,000 visitors a year and who some of those visitors have been. It is a project on a grand scale. There is a barrack block which may not be as long as an original but which gives an indication of living conditions.
Bear in mind that Zagan was a military town in Germany at the time of World War II. There were two camps: Stalag Luft 3, run by the Luftwaffe, and Stalag VIII C, an army camp. Roman numerals were used for army camps so Stalag Luft 3, being a Luftwaffe camp, should be written as such, not III. I found that Marek's information challenged my perceptions of what I had read in books so it made the visit even more interesting.
Many will have heard of the Great Escape. How many remember the Wooden Horse breakout? It was certainly one such escape which fired my imagination as a ten-year-old. Three men concealed in a vaulting horse and burrowing their way out (some 40 meters) underground whilst, one supposes, agile athletes leapt over the exercise horse. It is a rare feat of all involved in an escape making it to freedom.

That also took place at Stalag Luft 3 and Marek kindly took me to the site. There is not as much there but Marek has researched via GPS the point where the three escapers made their initial break for freedom and placed a kind of peg there. Look carefully for it on one of my photos please as the leaves at this time of the year obstructed it slightly.
At the site of the Great Escape, a memorial in the shape of the tunnel depicts where the tunnel started and where it ends. Names of escapers are engraved along the way and the breakout outside the camp is very slightly beyond a road (parts of which are original) and a replica sentry tower is situated nearby. Interestingly, the foundations of the original tower still exist and the distance between the tower and exit point shows how little space there was between the two. If visiting, it is easy to forget that the many trees which now surround the area did not exist at the time of the escape.
There is also a replica tunnel by the museum which visitors can enjoy. As one who is not greatly comfortable - an understatement - in enclosed spaces, it was a slight ordeal but one which I was determined to go through with. After changing my mind initially, I ensured that I did better the second time and winched myself through on the provided trolley but, yes, light at the end of the tunnel meant a lot when I finally made it at the other end. The internal dimensions are similar to the confined - and much longer - area within which the prisoners worked but it gives a very good impression of what they were up against. I may be completely wrong but I guessed that the replica tunnel was maybe thirty or so feet long. Whatever, it was plenty long enough for me! There used to be a Perspex roof but now the roof is completely covered over with concrete.
Marek dropped me off at the back entrance to the station, the ones the escapers used (and doubtless would have been grateful to for a lift from the camp). It had been a splendid visit and my thanks go to Marek for taking me around and making it so interesting. I had an easy enough journey back to Berlin and was reunited with my wooden horse in the room.
I managed to see Checkpoint Charlie that evening and was up a little later the following morning for the 1100 flight back to Heathrow. All seemed to be going promisingly when the inbound aircraft arrived half-an-hour early. Strange things happened again, though, and we were half-an-hour late in leaving because the system which registers people boarding the aircraft apparently failed so we had the ludicrous sight of someone calling through the details to someone else by telephone... Sometimes it has been luggage arriving late, other times the corridor which attaches to the aircraft door to allow exit has broken down but British Airways did well to still have us back at Heathrow on time after which I went to visit Turkish Airlines about the query on my forthcoming trip.
I am delighted to have finally visited the Stalag Luft 3 camp and museum and would recommend it very highly and hope that the enclosed photos with this article show how much of interest there is to see.