For this story, I'd like to take you all to something known as the Atlantic wall. This was the coastal defence build during World War II, by Nazi Germany roughly between 1942 and 1944, along the coast of continental Europe and Scandinavia to defend their territory from invasions.

At first, the plan was to build an enormous concrete wall from the coastline of Denmark all the way down to the Northern coastline of France, but seeing how such a gigantic wall, meandering the coastlines of Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium and France proved to be next to impossible, they came up with a new plan.

Organisation Todt was instructed to undertake the building of 200-250 strong points on the Channel Islands, and with the Regelbau system, they build over 600 types of bunkers with casemate and trenches, each having a specific purpose of keeping the enemies out and their citizens in.

There is much more I could explain about the Atlantic Wall, but to make a long story short, the majority of those bunkers and casemates were abandoned after the end of World War II and left scattered across Europe's coastline.

At the time of this story, two other archaeologists and I were researching the Atlantic wall as part of an international effort to get all this forgotten Heritage on the map (literally) and raise awareness for this often overlooked part of the World War II.

We first researched maps of the Atlantic wall, comparing them with satellite pictures to see what we could still find, and what was completely overtaken by mother nature. This part of the research might sound very dull, but it was quite exhilarating to train your eyes to spot these kinds of things.

For instance, a trench will always overgrow after it's abandoned for a couple of years, but the zigzag patron can remain visible in the landscape even decades after it was used. As soon in this picture.

This picture doesn't show any bunkers, but if you look closely you can see zigzag lines on the right side of the picture; those are trenches. You can also spot trenches in the left corner, with a casemate around it (the darker lines with triangle cutouts in them)

It's the same for a bunker. These concrete armoured constructions were more often than not built in a camouflaged way. The enemy wasn't supposed to see them, not even from the air, but if you train your eyes, you can spot the distinct shape in a satellite picture.

But spotting these constructions on pictures is one thing; finding them in real life is something else. Because that was the second part of our research, searching for everything we had spotted in the pictures and taking its measurements and coordinates to create one giant map of all the fortifications from the Atlantic wall.

This meant we had to go out into the dunes, in the middle of winter, for months to roam around and try to find the fortifications with GPS and our eyes as our only tools. Now, for those who have never experienced a winter in the Netherlands or Belgium before; we don't really have snow, not much at least, but the wind is like ice and will chill you to the bone, regardless of the amount of clothes you wear.

So, we headed out each morning into the areas of the dunes that are closed off for the general public (most of our research terrain was part of a protected nature reserve) with our GPS equipment, lots of hot coffee, food and our best hiking boots.

At the beginning of each day, we set out our route and then we would measure in anything we found in the map with the GPS until it was sundown and we went home, only to repeat the same process the next day.

These days were the most fun and the most exhausting. Sometimes we would find the bunkers or trenches in relatively good conditions, with even some artefacts still in them or we encountered some wildlife during our walks. But on another days we could hardly find anything, and just roamed around in the cold for hours.

This particular day was one of the latter. It was a rainy day in February when we (Natalie, Daniel and me) had hiked through an especially muddy part of the terrain, more like a swamp, in search of one of the last bunkers we had seen on the satellite. But no matter how many times we walked through that swamp we couldn't find any trace of the bunker. The rainy didn't help us either, only making everything muddier and colder.

The sun was setting when Daniel decided it was probably best to get back to the car. Natalie and I wholeheartedly agreed, we were soaked, tired and hungry, so the prospect of food and a warm shower sounded heavenly. It was my turn to carry the GPS (which is 2 meter or 6 feet tall, and weighs about 10kg) so with the car keys in my pocket I took the lead back to our car, my mind focused on what kind of dinner I wanted.

But I froze dead in my tracks as soon as our car came into view. Leaning against it was a large man, dressed from head-to-toe in camouflage army clothes, with nets and leafs wrapped around his torso. He looked like a guerilla fighter, and what made it even worse was that malicious grin that formed on his face as soon as he saw me.

I just stood there, like a deer caught in headlights, not daring to take my eyes of this creepy man as my mind raced through the following thoughts. How did he get into a closed off nature reserve? What is he doing here? Why is he standing at our car? And what the hell does he want from us?

Natalie and Daniel were luckily close behind me. As soon as the man spotted Daniel he took a view steps towards us, we were still several meters away from him, and said, "I've been observing you guys. You're looking for (insert exact name here) bunker, right?"

As if his clothes weren't warning enough, this guy just straight up opened with the line I've been "observing you" like it's the most normal thing in the world. My mind was in panic mode, all the red flags were going up, and from what I could sense both Daniel and Natalie were also super freaked out.

But Daniel, being the protective big brother type that he is, stiffed an awkward smile and placed himself between the man and us. "Yes, we were. But our shift is over, so we're just gonna go home."

The man took another step towards Daniel, "I can take you guys there if you want? I know where it is."

Natalie grabbed me by my arm and whispered as quietly as she could, "he has a knife in his pocket."

I followed her gaze, and low and behold, there was indeed the distinct shape of a large hunting knife in his camouflage pants. At this point, I was ready to make a run for it.

Natalie pulled the small pocket knife from her jacket and hid it in her sleeve. I lifted the sharp metal point of the GPS stick a little higher; if this man tried anything we were at least in greater numbers and also able to defend ourselves.

Luckily, Daniel was the calmest of us three, even though he was the closest to the creep, and kept smiling as he responded. "Oh, you are a 'bunkeraar'. Thanks for the help, man. Lead the way."

*(Bunkeraar is a Dutch term for people who like to explore bunkers. For the record, most of these people don't operate illegally, and this guy was definitely not one of them, but he clearly wanted to be.)

Judging by the man's reaction, he was way too happy to hear we would follow him and he started to walk away from our car in the opposite direction from which we came. Daniel motioned for us to follow, although he walked way slower than the man to come within our earshot. "Aly, give me your knife. You girls stay back, when I say 'go' we dash back to the car and make a break for it, okay?"

Natalie and I instantly agreed, and I gave him my pocket knife before he ran a little ahead to catch up with the creep, who by now was making sure we were actually following him.

Keeping our pace as slow as possible Natalie and I stayed as far back as we could without losing Daniel out of sight. Natalie tried to call the park's security, but in the middle of nowhere, we had no signal.

By now, we were approaching the edge of a forest, and we all knew there was no way the bunker was in there. This man was just trailing us along, for reasons I didn't want to think of, because I just wanted to scream for Daniel to get the hell out of here. We had been following this creep for more than 5 minutes and I could bare see our car anymore, but before I could call Daniel, I heard him scream and he came dashing towards us as if his life depended on it.

Both Natalie and I started to run as well, moving as fast as our feet could carry us. I didn't look back, and I didn't want to know if the man was behind us. I didn't care that the GPS was becoming heavy as hell, I just wanted to get out of there. As soon we approached the car, we jumped in, started it and booked it out of there with screeching tires.

I was in the back seat, and couldn't see the man anywhere behind us. But that didn't stop me from yelling at Natalie to drive faster.

That was until we reached the fence of the nature reserve. The gate was closed, and there was no one at the other end of the intercom. It was safe to say we all started to freak out.

Natalie was pushing the emergency intercom button like her life depended on it, Daniel was trying to call our boss as I was trying to reach the park's security, both with no luck. Then, suddenly, my dad rang me. I answered and tried to explain through sobbing and yelling that we were lock in the dunes with some armed camouflage creep, stalking us. But I think he couldn't make out what I was saying because his response was, "Okay sweetie. Call me when you get home." Click. Thanks, dad. 😒

As if by magic the gate opened and one of the guards let us through. It took us almost 10 minutes to explain the situation in a moderately calm way, but once the guard understood what had happened, he informed his colleagues and they would comb the area, because this man could be an illegal hunter.

On our way back to the office to drop off our gear, Daniel called our boss and explained everything. Luckily, he was very understanding. As soon as Daniel hang up the phone, he asked Natalie to stop the car in a parking spot.

"I have to tell you two something," he confessed.

As soon as the car was parked, he started to shake and told us the man had told him something very alarming when we followed him to the supposed bunker.

According to Daniel, this guy told him he had been following us all day. He could even name precisely where we had been, what we had eaten, every little detail. After that Daniel started to run towards us, no longer daring to take on this creepy man, even if we were with greater numbers.

The fact that this man had been following us all day, without any of us noticing was too creepy for words. Not, to mention, insane. Why would you follow a bunch of stranger throughout a nature reserve, where you're not supposed to be, in camouflage clothing?

And why did he fabricate that lie about knowing where the bunker was? It was not in the direction in which he went; there were no bunkers at all in that forest.

Unfortunately, the man was never found. But we never reencountered him, and at the end of the day, I had a horrifying story to tell my parents, especially my father.

Also, Natalie and I later bought a big bottle of Daniel's favourite whisky as thanks for being so protective of us, and keeping us far away from that creepy man. He would never admit it, but I believe he was just as scared as we were, so it was incredibly brave of him to put himself in harm's way to protect us.

-Tomorrow I'll talk about that time I dragged a nurse to a haunted castle for the sake of, what else, archaeology!-