Road Trip - Rommel's Cave Museum in Marsa Matruh

Whew! We made it  It took fourteen blog posts from me and four from Linda and three weeks time but we have finally have made it to Rommel's Cave Museum in Marsa Matruh.

From our room at the Belle Vue, we could almost see the museum located on Rommel Point right across Rommel Bay.

We were the only visitors on the morning we arrived and located the museum entrance.







The cave is the real attraction, we discovered, as we wound our way down the tunnel which opens out into a cavernous "Map room."






There are a few minor weapons and memorabilia on display but the real attraction is to see the room itself.  The maps on display are not particularly legible or notable; the best map I found on the trip was actually in the small Italian cemetery museum.





The fact that Rommel's only son, Manfred, then the mayor of Stuttgart actually donated these items adds to their historic significance.

What happened to Erwin Rommel?  I only saw a couple of references to his death anywhere in these museums, and then only to the year as 1944.  He was suspected of involvement in the assassination attempt on Hitler and was forced to commit suicide.  The full story is found here.  Read the whole thing.  As son, Manfred, fifteen years old at the time recounts it:

... A few minutes later I heard my father come upstairs and go into my mother's room. Anxious to know what was afoot, I got up and followed him. He was standing in the middle of the room, his face pale.

'Come outside with me,' he said in a tight voice. We went into my room. 'I have just had to tell your mother,' he began slowly, 'that I shall be dead in a quarter of an hour.' ...

  Manfred lived until 2013 and was mayor of Stuttgart from 1974 to 1996.

 And then, still early in the morning, we said goodbye to Marsa Matruh and headed back to Cairo,



As always, there are many more pictures on Flickr, just click on any of the pictures you find above and browse through them.