World War II legacy at Fjell festning

Relics of the second world war can be stumbled upon in many parts of Norway. Let's face it reinforced concrete and inch thick armour plating are difficult things to get rid of. Sometimes the area name will give the fact away that it was once a military area, with the word 'festning' or fortress tacked on to a village or town name.

We visited one at the weekend on the island of Sotra, about 50 minutes drive from Bergen. Sotra was the first line of defence of Bergen towards the Atlantic, and the Germans built a large underground fortress manned by a massive gun turret with 3 guns taken from the German battleship the Gneisenau, which was badly damaged in an Allied raid in 1942. The gun had a range of 37km - it was big.

The gun is no longer there now. It was called Bruno and was one of three from the Gneisenau, The first one (Anton) was split up and the guns used in Denmark, Bruno ended up at Fjell and Caesar ended up in Ørland, on the coast just outside of Trondheim, a major submarine base for the Germans during the war.

Anyway for NOK 30 you can wander around the inside of the turret that was under the gun, which goes down 3 stories and also outside around the hillside where the remains of buildings and anti-aircraft gun emplacements, etc. can be seen. If you pay NOK 60 you can get a guided tour - we had just missed the beginning of one so cheated a bit and listened in on some of the things the tour guide was saying as he took people round (we didn't join the whole tour, with only 10 people there I think they would have noticed!!)




 

Anti aircraft gun

The fort was still being built by Russian prisoners of war when the Germans capitulated in 1945, apparently they reckoned it would take another 10 years to complete the fortress to the standard required. It needed a proper hospital, and probably better accommodation/

Armour plating left to rust



Surprisingly peaceful considering the history there

We saw some aerial surveillance photos of the area, taken by the allies whilst the fortress was being dug out, which showed piles of stones cascading down the mountainside like a rockfall, and then next time a picture was taken, the pile was much larger! Difficult to hide that kind of bulding project - especially if there is a mighty great gun, etc. planted there for all to see (and avoid).

Beautiful scenery as ever, and this time fully accessible for everyone (no mountains to climb, or animal tracks to follow)!!


If we had the time, I could see us going to see the gun that survived the war. It is still in place up in Trondheim but a good 2 hours drive from the city and we won't have a car next weekend when we go there.  Ah well!

View across Sotra to the Atlantic \ocean from the top of Fjell Festning