In May 2013, Sarah and I were travelling in Bavaria, southern Germany, and we were able to visit Eichstaett, where the POW camp that Conder and the others described as ‘paradise’ (at least, as POW camps went) because of the birds there. The camp is, ironically, still surrounded by wire – it’s now a Police training college. But some of the buildings are still there. To read more about what we saw, see my Guardian Country Diary piece here.