Earlier this week by some cosmic coincidence the GirlfriendWife and I had a day off work at the same time. If that wasn`t enough the weather was also very nice and summery, so naturally we decided on a roadtrip.
A few hours drive away is the large island Senja with its beautiful nature and many WW2- and Cold War installations. We were up and awake even before the morning mist had lifted off the yellow fields, and after coffee we joined the morning rush on the road. We soon left the main road and had the asphalt more or less for ourselves the rest of the way to our destination, the old German coastal fortification Skrolsvik Fort on the south-western part of Senja. Here we spent the day bunkercrawling, climbing over rocks and getting stuck in old barbed wire and checking out the old buildings within the fort.
Even though the fort is in decay and could use some serious caretaking, and despite the risk of injury moving outside the main trail it is a very exciting place to visit and I highly reccommend it. If you are not that into falling apart old bunkers the spectacular views from the place should be reason enough :)
The germans began the work on the fortress in winter 1941. By early summer the first cannons were on place and the fort operative. Other than Flak and MGs it was armed with four 10.5 cm french Schneider guns ( 10.5 cm 332 K (f) ) and it was named Heereskusten-batterie `Senjehesten` ( HKB 16/973 ).
In 1943 this batterie was moved north to Nordmanset near Nordkapp, and Skrolsvik were taken over by marine units and renamed Marinekusten-batterie Skrolsvik ( MKB 6/511 Skrolsvik ). The four new guns were fresh from the Skoda factories, 15 cm. SKC/28 (`Schnellade kanon C/28`) with a range to 23500 m and they are the ones still standing there today.
After the war the Norwegian Army took over the fort and it was in use until 1989. For a short time in the early 2000s it looked like the place would be restored and used as a museum but sadly that project collapsed as soon as the money ran out.
Slideshow of the fortification:
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