Fort De Regret was built around 1875-77 as part of the Verdun defense.
This was our first stop of two locations this day. We could deduce online that people had accessed the fort not too long ago so we thought we would give it a go.
We arrived and it was quiet, out by farmers fields. Down a long narrow road without much opportunity to pull off anywhere and be more discreet. Reasonable parking was pretty much at the end of the road in front of the fort. So much for subtlety but nobody was around…
It had the typical French military non-entry signs. We started walking around the moat area, checking out the front entrance. The moat was relatively clean, not a lot of overgrowth and the front entrance was securely gated.
About this time we hear another vehicle pull up. We knew it was quite obvious we were there and we hadn’t gotten far so we figured the best course of action was to just walk back out, see who it was, play dumb.
As we are walking up the path out of the moat we see 2 men, one in full camouflage fatigues and we are thinking “ahhh shit, someone saw us, tipped off the military, hope this doesn’t go sideways”. As we get closer, they are looking at us but passively, while also looking at the Fort. I’m thinking “well, that’s a good sign, they don’t seem to care too much about us”. We realize military guy looks like he is maybe not exactly up to military standards, just a guy in military fatigues.
I thought well, maybe they are doing the same as us and I’ll just go talk to them. After basic greeting I asked if they are planning on going in, the guy in the fatigues, unamused, pulls out some keys on a lanyard and shakes them a bit. He said they were working on cleaning it up. I figured I’d take the chance and see if they would let us have a quick 👀 inside. Pausing, looking us up and down, still not amused, he hesitantly said something in broken English like “Okay but we are working, real short”.
So he lets us in the front gate and says something like “just look right here” while he goes around the corner to retrieve some things, presumably to start working. He comes back with a headlamp on and some other gear and proceeds to take us on a roughly 2 hour thorough tour, explaining the different sections, letting us operate the working turrets and so forth! It was an amazing experience with a gracious host. We were just in the right place at the right time.
I mostly took videos so my best inside shots are not my pictures but I thought it was an interesting experience worth sharing.
While we were there a group of Belgian guys showed up in this. It seems like maybe they had arranged something as they were expected.
This was our first stop of two locations this day. We could deduce online that people had accessed the fort not too long ago so we thought we would give it a go.
We arrived and it was quiet, out by farmers fields. Down a long narrow road without much opportunity to pull off anywhere and be more discreet. Reasonable parking was pretty much at the end of the road in front of the fort. So much for subtlety but nobody was around…
It had the typical French military non-entry signs. We started walking around the moat area, checking out the front entrance. The moat was relatively clean, not a lot of overgrowth and the front entrance was securely gated.
About this time we hear another vehicle pull up. We knew it was quite obvious we were there and we hadn’t gotten far so we figured the best course of action was to just walk back out, see who it was, play dumb.
As we are walking up the path out of the moat we see 2 men, one in full camouflage fatigues and we are thinking “ahhh shit, someone saw us, tipped off the military, hope this doesn’t go sideways”. As we get closer, they are looking at us but passively, while also looking at the Fort. I’m thinking “well, that’s a good sign, they don’t seem to care too much about us”. We realize military guy looks like he is maybe not exactly up to military standards, just a guy in military fatigues.
I thought well, maybe they are doing the same as us and I’ll just go talk to them. After basic greeting I asked if they are planning on going in, the guy in the fatigues, unamused, pulls out some keys on a lanyard and shakes them a bit. He said they were working on cleaning it up. I figured I’d take the chance and see if they would let us have a quick 👀 inside. Pausing, looking us up and down, still not amused, he hesitantly said something in broken English like “Okay but we are working, real short”.
So he lets us in the front gate and says something like “just look right here” while he goes around the corner to retrieve some things, presumably to start working. He comes back with a headlamp on and some other gear and proceeds to take us on a roughly 2 hour thorough tour, explaining the different sections, letting us operate the working turrets and so forth! It was an amazing experience with a gracious host. We were just in the right place at the right time.
I mostly took videos so my best inside shots are not my pictures but I thought it was an interesting experience worth sharing.
While we were there a group of Belgian guys showed up in this. It seems like maybe they had arranged something as they were expected.
