You have an up close and personal encounter with the prisoners of the Ninth Fort. An encounter it will be unlikely I will ever forget.
The monument at the Ninth Fort (Devintojo Forto Statula) is a Soviet-era memorial to the estimated 30,000 Jews and 20,000 other persons who were murdered here during the Holocaust. The statue by artist A. Ambraziunas stands about 105 feet high and 300 feet wide and was unveiled in 1984. The Ninth Fort had previously been used as a prison before World War II and was also used as a KGB interrogation prison and as a place to keep political prisoners before sending them to Siberia. Such a sad place.Pay extra for the English-speaking guide. If the English-speaking guide isn't available, the German-speaking guide actually also speaks English.Go early in the day to give yourself enough time to see the place properly.
We took a taxi from our hotel in the city centre to get here, as the bus journey looked slightly complicated.Upon arrival, I asked not once - but twice - for an English tour guide and paid for our tickets. We entered the first museum, which was interesting and took us less than an hour to see what we wanted to.At this point, I wondered when our English tour would commence. When I enquired, we were shown in the direction of the actual fort. Upon arrival there, we we advised that we had not paid for a guide after all and any case "everything on display was also in English". I offered to return to the main entrance to pay for a guide (which would have only taken a few minutes), but the body language of the staff implied that they really weren't that interested in providing the tour (at least in English), with comments like "the tour can last two hours and it's cold". I suspect that this was because we were virtually the only visitors there.So, we continued our visit unaided and - surprise, surprise - only some of the information on display had English translation. However, what we saw was interesting and worth the visit.
I took the Service Bus from outside the Theatre on Kestucio Gatve, which costs only 60 Euro Cents each way. You can't miss the stop because you can see the monument outside the fort for miles. A short walk and you are at the museum which has three parts, a museum to the oppressed both by the Nazi's and the Soviets, then a walk to the Fort itself, then the Monument to the murdered itself (30,000 Jews were killed her during the war). It's daunting, moving and really worth the visit. Only downside is that not everything on display has English explanations.
I used live next to this place and visited so many times. Very worth to go inside the museum and tunnels with guide. Outside monuments are on a list of the most strange buildings created by Russians sculptors.
A place worth a visit for someone who is interested in WW II history. It was built as a fort to protect the city, later turned into jail and on a later day turned into concentration camp (death camp). The hole museum if walking slow takes about 3 hours. You can visit exposition alone, but the dungeon (underground passages) must be visited with a guide. Price for guide services is abt. 4 Euro for 1 group. (group can be even 2 persons). Exposition is sad and shocking. Lots of photos, personal belongings from prisoners and Jews sentenced to death in that camp and extracts from papers and documents. It was my 3rd (maybe 4th) visit, and still very impressing. Helps to understand what a terrible thing war is.
Museum and unusual park in one place. If not interested in WWII or holocoust, you can have a nice walk with breathtaking view to Kaunas. Pictures looks great too!
Every man must see what horrible things happened during the world war 2 to prevent it from happening again. This museum and monument will help you.Very good museum
You can't visit Kaunas without going to the Ninth Fort. Take the 57 taxi bus from the city centre and then walk the last 5 mins. We paid for an English speaking guide £2.50 extra. This was well worth it. There is a very good memorial centre at the beginning. You then walk up to the fort itself, which is fully intact. The fort has a varied history including being used as a fort, a prison and concentration camp where 50000 people lost their lives. Honestly this is a must visit.
Very moving and Amazing, a must visit but go by cab and not bus, approx €30 return. The bus is a little complicated