The village of Equihen-Plage to the south of Boulogne-sur-Mer boasts a fascinating mixture of bunker sites including positions for anti-aircraft guns, a radio guidance station, defensive batteries, and multiple strongpoints.
Stp267 Lowenzahn is a small defensive site with personnel shelters and a rare R198 type water storage bunker, one of only eight ever built on the Atlantikwall.
The R198 featured five chambers inside for drinking water tanks and was designed to hold around 60 cubic metres of water.
Located next to the Avenue des Canadians – a road named in homage to the area’s liberators – it has sadly become overgrown with thick gorse and can no longer be accessed.
Elsewhere at the site are two pairs of Vf3 machine gun/observation posts with 360 fire direction and Vf2a single group shelters, plus a Vf2a with nearby Michelmannstand for a heavy machine gun.
The whole area has been developed for a holiday village, camping sites, and motorhome parks – with more construction underway during winter 2024 – so many of these buildings have disappeared from view. The easiest to spot is the square-shaped Vf3 at the south west of the site and this stands in grazing land so may have escaped the developers for the time being.