We are staying in Reims and driving to Bastogne to see Battle of the Bulge Museum(s). Wondering if there are nearby sites of Maginot line worth visiting?
Posted by
San Francisco
15020 posts
For that event I suggest going to Luxembourg City.
Posted by
IJzendijke, The Netherlands
2106 posts
Getting to Schoenenburg from Reims needs a lot of time, instead you can visit Fort Hackenberg, some 20km east of Thionville. Think they are almost identical to eachother. The guided visits in Hackenberg include rides with a narrow gage train to different parts of the site, no idea if Schoenenberg has that too. During my visit 5 years ago I joined a German guided tour, there are English guided tours but very limited. https://maginot-hackenberg.com/download/flyer_en.pdf?1704024380
Posted by
Mid-Atlantic area
7206 posts
We visited Fort Schoenenbourg in the spring and it does not have the train ride. It was much more impressive than we thought it would be. We first visited the outdoors Blocs de combat du fort de Schoenenbourg before visiting the fort itself. Once inside the fort one can walk over to the gun emplacements from the inside, but it is a long walk.
At Verdun we visited the Herméville cannon (out in the middle of nowhere), the impressive museum, the cemetery, and Fort Douaumont.
In Luxembourg we visited the American cemetery and since you’re interested In Bastogne, the National Museum of Military History in Dikrech. Its main focus is on the Battle of the Bulge.
We did have a rental car so getting to places was easy.
Posted by
San Francisco
15020 posts
Thionville...now, that's a nice, interesting and intriguing town, spent a couple of hours there visiting the centre-ville, etc as a day trip from Metz in Sept. Visited the Tourist Office and a staff woman asked me, coming from California, why the interest in small Thionville .....a very pleasant talk.
A couple of hours in the afternoon there hardly enough as I had assumed, just served to heighten my interest in going back this coming summer's trip.
Should you also be interested in WW1 as well the events surrounding Bastogne, the area around Thionville and Metz was a bloody and horrific battle area, ie, the Battle of the Frontiers. The numerous French and German military cemeteries and memorials in the surrounding villages attest to that.
You can get to them by having the Tourist Office arrange it.