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Original poster

Where to go in Europe for WW2 history stuff

72 replies

PogChamps · 07/12/2025 13:21

Recently got interested (again) in WW2 and wondering what specific cities and areas within countries would be good for really good WW2 history learning.

I was in Budapest this summer and enjoyed it. I've done Paris already. I want to do Vienna, Prague but then there's so much of Germany to see.

OP posts:
Crikeyalmighty · 08/12/2025 22:47

Nurnberg, Berlin - Ypres, Malta has a really superb museum too in Valletta if you want to combine with a lovely city and a bit of weather

Crikeyalmighty · 08/12/2025 22:50

Auschwitz combines with Krakow, also a lovely city to visit - it’s a very sobering and moving experience ,

HostaCentral · 08/12/2025 22:59

My dad used to take me to all the war graves on the Italian Gothic line. Nobody really gives Italy much notice for WW2, and what interest there is is mostly towards the Americans at Anzio and Rome and Monte Casino, But..... British and commonwealth soldiers were killed in their thousands and there are many war graves all through Tuscany and into Umbria and Emilia Romagna.

Dad visited his dead friends in Coriano ridge, and Gradara. Gradara is just under a fabulous medieval castle as well, history upon history.

Driving around and along all the hills and ridges of central Italy gives some idea of how difficult it must have been to drive the Germans from all their high defensive positions. They had a nasty habit of executing the resistance as they went as well. Whole villages wiped out. Dad was a tank commander and stayed in Italy after the war to run a POW camp. He met and married my Mum, an Italian .....Which is how he ended up speaking German, Italian, and also Hebrew, his best man was Jewish!

I love history.

DailyMaui · 08/12/2025 23:08

I followed my grandad's own WW2 progress from Naples up to Florence and beyond. He'd been in North Africa before that but I knew less about it so haven't visited any sites there.

It made it all very personal. He talked vividly about his time in Italy, seeing Vesuvius erupting from a boat in the bay of Naples, the beauty of the towns and cities. He said when he came home that Scotland looked very grey and drab compared to Italy!

HostaCentral · 08/12/2025 23:17

@DailyMaui Have you read James Holland's books in the war in Italy? They are very good. "Italys Sorrow" Lots of detail of 1944/45 battles.

TangerinePlate · 08/12/2025 23:24

Awesome thread

ZenNudist · 08/12/2025 23:25

Definitely berlin. Went recently. Book yourself on the 90 minute tour of the reichstag. Our guide gave us loads if the history of the weimar Republic and how the nazis took power, and the storming of the reichstag by the Russians gave me chills, seeing the graffiti left behind by the Russians which Germany have preserved.

also go to potsdam which is where they negotiated terms at the end of WW2 in tge celeicenhof conference rooms, currently closed for refurbishment but potsdam and the sansouci Palace is worth seeing.

I liked the DDR museum about life in East Germany.

So many museums worth seeing about this portion of German history.

Wednesdaysotherchild · 08/12/2025 23:46

Belgium - Ardennes, loads there.

KnottyKnitting · 09/12/2025 00:02

I was going to say the Channel Islands too- there is a fabulous museum on Guernsey called the occupation museum- totally fascinating and the islands are covered German forts. The ones on Alderney are untouched and free to walk around.

Laughingravy · 09/12/2025 00:03

Belgium? Try Bastogne and the Battle of the Bulge? Nearby is the Hurtgen Forest, scene of some particularly bloody fighting and rarely mentioned in the history books. Then there's the endless dragons teeth of the Siegfried line, stretching for miles and not so far away Arnhem, the bridge too far. Just over the border in Eifel mountains is the chocolate box of Monschau, for some light relief and near there is one of the most poignant war cemeteries I've ever visited - it holds the remains of hundreds of Russian slave labourers who perished building the Siegfried line. History lies heavy there.
And what about taking in the Ruhr dams a little further east?

Ihitthetarget · 09/12/2025 00:03

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/oradour-sur-glane-martyred-village

I visited the village above in France as a mid teen and its stayed with me - now seems a ruined village but what happened there was horrendous. We stopped en route home from a lovely French holiday (my df was into history) so not sure what is around there, but remember it as very pretty of you wanted to see as part of a trip.

Otherwise would second what other posters have said: Berlin is absolutely fascinating, with very good museums and history at every turn, and Krakow is a beautiful city to visit with Auschwitz nearby (glad I went but couldn't wait to leave it).

Oradour-sur-Glane: Martyred Village

The visible remains of Nazi brutality.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/oradour-sur-glane-martyred-village

mathanxiety · 09/12/2025 04:26

Poland.

ACynicalDad · 09/12/2025 04:58

Gdansk has a couple of great museum’s, one on WW2. It’s easy and cheap to travel around Poland and potentially visit a camp. Holland has one on operation market garden in Nijmegen which was good.

gerispringer · 09/12/2025 05:12

Salő on Lake Garda has a museum with an interesting exhibition on Mussolini and the republic he set up along Lake Garda in 1943(?). Theres a 5 star hotel in Gargnano which was his base for a while. Its a lovely part of the world to go for a holiday as well!

ArcticGrass · 09/12/2025 07:37

Jersey was unexpectedly fascinating, the war tunnels exhibits were very moving. Berlin is incredible.

OnlyFrench · 13/12/2025 22:10

DailyMaui · 08/12/2025 23:08

I followed my grandad's own WW2 progress from Naples up to Florence and beyond. He'd been in North Africa before that but I knew less about it so haven't visited any sites there.

It made it all very personal. He talked vividly about his time in Italy, seeing Vesuvius erupting from a boat in the bay of Naples, the beauty of the towns and cities. He said when he came home that Scotland looked very grey and drab compared to Italy!

Have you read Still Life by Sarah Winman? It might appeal to you, partly set in Italy during and post WWII

DailyMaui · 20/12/2025 11:56

OnlyFrench · 13/12/2025 22:10

Have you read Still Life by Sarah Winman? It might appeal to you, partly set in Italy during and post WWII

Show quote history

Yes I love that book. Probably the main reason we all went to Florence this year!

It's very easy to think of my granddad when reading the early parts. Plus I think if my granddad had been offered the chance to relocate to Italy he would have been off like a flash. The war gave him real wanderlust which was sadly not matched by my very reluctant to travel granny.

OnlyFrench · 20/12/2025 11:59

@DailyMauimy uncle brought back an Italian wife….slightly unfortunate for the English one he already had at home !

FionnulaTheCooler · 20/12/2025 12:00

Krakow, definitely. Obviously you can visit Auschwitz but I also found it fascinating walking around the Jewish quarter of the city and we saw the outside of Schindler's factory although didn't go in but you can take a tour. We did visit a synagogue which was taken over by the Germans in WW2 and used as stables for their horses.

eggandonion · 20/12/2025 16:45

Krakow is a lovely city as well as the wartime parts. And the food is wonderful.

Maddy70 · 21/12/2025 00:58

Nuremberg. Fascinating and such a wonderful town

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