Operation Merkur: Battle of Crete Tour

[Willi Z.]

Thanks for the link Mike! I see the owner died in 2007. He had alot of passion for the history of the battle.

[unglesbeemj]

Willi - yes, the son and his wife are the caretakers now and opened the house for me. Unfortunately, we were not able to strike up much of a conversation because their English was limited, and so is my Greek - I attended high school in Athens in another life - but don't remember much of my Greek. I tried to engage the son, but did not find him overly interested in the history. I sure would have liked to have had the opportunity to meet the original owner before he passed away.

Mike

[Max Wünsche]

Fantastic information here, love the photos......!

I have been doing research on a family member who was invloved in the conflict (debacle) on Crete

My grandmothers brother was in the 2/6th Battalion of the Australian 6th division and fought during the withdrawal from the Greek mainland and then on Crete and was one of the lucky ones to be evacuated and hence avoided capture!

I have his service records as well as an original letter sent back from the middle east not long after the evacuation...



Love the part about the fallschirmjäger not being as easy a target as he expected.








...

[DonC]

Great thread, Mike - thank you!

Don

[Ludwig]

Very interesting thread!

[Chet Sowersby]

Wonderful presentation Mike. Thank you!

Chet

[seebee1]

Many thanks Mike for sharing images and details of your excellent trip

[herrzark]

Great thread.hope to go to chania to this summer .

[John R.]

Small update as of last week. The Hill 107 cafe is closed. The naval museum is quite nice though and will take 3-4 hours to go through properly. Much more to it than just the Battle of Crete exhibit.

John

[Ludwig]

Small update as of last week. The Hill 107 cafe is closed. The naval museum is quite nice though and will take 3-4 hours to go through properly. Much more to it than just the Battle of Crete exhibit.

John

Pity! It was a nice café with a very nice collection!
Been there a couple of times.

[Gran Sasso]

Small update as of last week. The Hill 107 cafe is closed.

Is it closed because the season hasnt started - or shut down?

[John R.]

Hard to say. There was no sign on the building and just a few chairs and tables inside. Nothing else inside and nothing outside.

It is possible that it was only closed until season. Hopefully it will be there in the summer.

John

[cw2311]

Great pictures! I was in beautiful Crete for the 72nd anniversary and visited many of the same places you did and interestingly enough, took several pictures of the same things, including the grave of General Bruno Brauer. My wife has family there, so it certainly helped with making great contacts and having her as my translator.

Cheers

[John R.]

A couple more

[John R.]

Captain Pendlebury's grave.

John