When it comes to understanding history, visiting significant sites can be an eye-opening experience. Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, located just outside Berlin, Germany, is one such place. If you are an absolute beginner and planning a visit, this guide will provide you with all the essential information you need to know for your journey.

Getting There

This concentration camp is located about 35 kilometers, or 22 miles, north of Berlin, which means that the camp can be easily visited, whether tourists choose an organized tour or not. Here are a few options for reaching the site:

By Train:

It is possible to take a train from Berlin to Oranienburg – the town nearest to Sachsenhausen. Several trains are available daily, and these depart from Berlin Hauptbahnhof (main train station) and the journey does take anything between 30-40 minutes depending on the train used. Located twenty kilometers north east of Berlin, or twenty five kilometers south west of Stettiner, it is just a bus ride away or half an hours to forty five minutes’ walk, from Oranienburg.

By Guided Tour:

But if organization is more of your liking then it is recommended that a joining a guided tour will be helpful. There are many companies that can provide visitors with transport, guides, and tickets, but if you have an opportunity, it is better to contact local agencies that will explain the history of the camp in detail. It is advised to see the local tour operators or do some online search to know the best option available to you.

Visiting the Camp

First of all, a visitor should be psychologically ready to face it, before arriving at Sachsenhausen. Designated as a historical site, the site should be respected and treated as historians seek evidence for their historical work.

Arrival and Entrance:

Sachsenhausen is the visitors’ gate, and once you arrive here you must go through the entrance of the visitors center. Here; maps, information desk, and other exhibitions will be provided to help you navigate through the camp.

Exploring the Camp:

Sachsenhausen is huge, and one is lost to just wander around without any plan of what to see first. The first we suggest is to go to the museum, where one can get acquainted with the history of the camp. You may also need to take a guided tour so as to get more information.

Some key areas of interest within the camp include:

The Appellplatz: The square where the prisoners were assembled and receive strict treatment.

Barracks: Visit the living quarters recreated to try and understand how the prisoners lived their lives.

Infirmary: Learn the rights or lack of them of prisoners to medical care and the horrors that prisoners went through inside these medical facilities.

Execution Trench: Consider the cynical experience of the camp, in which people died like flies.

Station Z: Visitors can also honour the concentration camp victims at the memory wall and witness first-hand how the Nazis killed gypsies.

Respecting the Site:

Sachsenhausen is a place of concentration but today it is used as a memorial so silence and courtesy are expected . Some of the viewers myself included may think that this site gives morale support to death and sufferings of many innocent people.

Practical Tips

Here are a few practical tips to make your visit to Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp more comfortable:

Comfortably dress some sections of the camp are open and the weather may be extremem.

No necessity to wear very formal clothes, it is also recommend to take comfortable shoes because there is a lot of walking during the tour.

Remember to carry along a bottle of water and a snack in case the event gets in the way of you having to get some food.

Chinese oblige enough time to visit. It should take at least half a day to go around the site and take a closer look at everything that has been done.

Final Thoughts

Seeing Concentration Camp in Sachsenhausen is something very memorable that we can do and should be done to guarantee that never again can man treat man in such inhuman ways. With information provided in this guide, you will have everything you need to start your trip from Berlin to Sachsenhausen with both an understanding and a profound respect.