In the second half of the 19th century the humble mountain village of Obersalzberg was transformed into one of the most important health resorts in Germany.

The opening of a guesthouse called 'Pension Moritz' by Mauritia Mayer in 1877 led to the rise of tourism at Obersalzberg. Bruno Büchner, a later owner, changed the name of the guesthouse to Platterhof in the Nineteen Twenties.

It was extended from 1936 to a hotel for "verdiente Volksgenossen" [members of the national community rewarded for commendable service]. During the war the hotel was used as a Millitary hospital.

Adolf Hitler visited Obersalzberg for the first time in May 1923. After his premature release from imprisonment in the prison of Landsberg/Lech he repeatedly returned to Obersalzberg, where he also dictated the second part of "Mein Kampf" [My Struggle]. After the "Seizure of Power" Obersalzberg became a place of pilgrimage for enthusiastic Hitler supporters from throughout the Reich. Soon the only people to be admitted were organized groups and guests of the Party and the government. Obersalzberg thus evolved into a major element in NS propaganda and the Hitler myth.

The Berghof was developed in stages from a much smaller chalet called Haus Wachenfeld, a holiday home built in 1916 [or 1917] by Kommerzienrat Otto Winter, a businessman from Buxtehude. This was located near the Platterhof, the former "Pension Moritz" where Hitler had stayed in 1923. By 1926, the family running the Pension had left and Hitler did not like the new owner. He moved first to the "Marineheim" and then to a hotel in Berchtesgaden, the "Deutsches Haus", where he dictated the second volume of "Mein Kampf" in the summer of 1926. Hitler met his alleged lover Maria Reiter, who worked in a shop on the ground floor of the hotel, during another visit in autumn 1926.

Only two women had emerged with any clarity from Adolf Hitler's shadowy private life: his youthful niece, Geli Raubal, and Eva Braun. Both died violent deaths. When in March 1959 Hitler's sister, Paula Wolf, casually mentioned to a German reporter that she had recently visited with "perhaps the only woman my brother ever loved," Günter Peis' news instincts were understandably aroused. The woman turned out to be Maria Reiter, blonde, buxom and 49, now living quietly in a Munich suburb. Reluctant at first, Maria finally gave Peis the long-kept secret of her uneven romance with Hitler from 1926 into the '30s. As Peis reported it in the German weekly, "Der Stern", and in the "London Sunday Pictorial", it was straight soap opera. But Maria had letters to prove it. Mimi and Wolf It all began in a Berchtesgaden park, in 1926. Maria, 16, and Hitler, 37, were walking their police dogs. He was just a struggling young party leader then. Hitler liked Maria's fresh Nordic charm, and she confessed to her sister: "He cuts a fine figure with those riding breeches and that riding crop". Hitler invited her to come and hear him speak. Afterward, he fed her cake with his fingers, but when she refused him a good-night kiss, Hitler glowered and stalked out with an abrupt "Heil!" But soon they were taking long rides in Hitler's Mercedes. Hitler called her "Mimi," and at his request she called him "Wolf". The only thing that troubled Mimi was that Wolf would never put down his riding crop. Then one golden day they got out of the car and romped in the meadows like children. Leading Mimi to a tall pine, Hitler said: "Just stand there as you are. You're my forest sprite . . . Later you will understand". It was their first stormy kiss. "I was so happy I wished I could die," says Maria. On the way back to the car, Hitler told her that his ideal was to marry and have blond children, but that he must save Germany first. After that, there were tète-à-tètes in Hitler's Munich apartment, and they dreamed aloud of their future together. But it was not to be. Liebesnacht Worried by rumors that his romance with Mimi was hurting him politically, Hitler broke things off in the summer of 1928. Mimi tried hanging herself, but her brother-in-law found her and cut her down before she died. After this episode Reiter gave up on Hitler and married a local hotelkeeper in Seefeld. But the marriage was not a success. In 1931 Reiter left her husband. Then in January 1931, there was a knock on her door. It was Rudolf Hess. "Hitler sent me," he said. "He wants to know if you are happy". Maria got the idea and soon ran off to Munich. There was a touching reconciliation on Hitler's sofa and one breathless Liebesnacht—night of love. Peis quoted Maria: "I let him do what he wanted. I was never so happy". Hitler told her: "Mimilein, I'm rich now. I can offer you everything. Stay with me . . . I've never loved any woman as I love you", but Reiter wanted marriage. Hitler was concerned that a relationship with a woman who had left her husband would be politically damaging to him, so the couple parted. Nevertheless Hitler delegated his personal lawyer Hans Frank to handle her divorce. In 1934 after Hitler's rise to power, Reiter met him once more and he again asked her to become his lover. Again she refused. This led to an angry argument in which Hitler reiterated that he could not marry or have children because he had a "big mission" to fulfill. Eventually Mimi married Hauptsturmführer Georg Kubisch, an SS officer, in 1936. Hitler congratulated Kubisch on his marriage at an assembly of the SS in Munich. Kubisch was killed in 1940 during the Battle of Dunkirk, after which Hitler sent Mimi a hundred red roses. Mimi's last meeting with Hitler was in his apartment on Prinzregentenstrasse in Munich in 1938. "Are you happy, Wolf?" she asked him there. "No, if you mean with Eva," answered Hitler. "I tell her every day she ought to find some young fellow. I'm too old". [Hitler was then 49]. Then Mimi asked her old lover what everyone else was asking: "Will there be war?" Der Führer shrugged his shoulders and turned away. The details of Reiter's story about their physical relationship cannot be confirmed, though the fact that Hitler was in love with her was asserted by his sister Paula Hitler, who stated that she was the only woman who might have curbed his destructive impulses. Further, two letters dating from April 1945 by Reiter to Hitler were found after the war. They were "written in affectionate terms" and suggest intimacy by the words used.

In 1928, Winter's widow rented Haus Wachenfeld to Hitler  for 100 Reichsmarks in 1928, and his half-sister Angela came to live there as housekeeper, although she left soon after her daughter Geli's 1931 death in Hitler's Munich apartment.

In 1933 Hitler was eventually able to purchase the house with funds he received through the sale of his book "Mein Kampf", and in the following years the modest country house was converted into the Berghof.

Other than the Wolfsschanze ("Wolf's Lair"), his headquarters in East Prussia for the invasion of the Soviet Union, Hitler spent more time at the Berghof than anywhere else during World War II. It was also one of the most widely known of his headquarters, which were located throughout Europe.

The site is breathtakingly scenic. The valley below appears by illusion to be a lake almost at one's feet.

Other leading NS figures settled there as well: Hermann Göring, Martin Bormann, Albert Speer [Hitler's favorite architect after the death of Paul Ludwig Troost]. After the former inhabitants had been driven out, the erstwhile health resort was turned into the 'Führersperrgebiet' [the "Führer’s off-limits area"] with an infrastructure allowing the execution of government. The old village and its inhabitants, some of whom were families who had lived here for hundreds of years, had to yield to these new circumstances. Within a few short years the entire region of Berchtesgaden evolved into a second seat of government, a "Branch Office of Berlin".

Obersalzberg was not only a center from which power was exercised, it was also a political arena for the 'Cult of Hitler', through which the 'Führer" Myth' – legitimizing Hitler's personal dictatorship - was continually nurtured.

The small chalet-style building was refurbished and much expanded during 1935–36 by architect Alois Degano when it was renamed The Berghof. A large terrace was built and featured big, colourful, resort-style canvas umbrellas. The entrance hall "was filled with a curious display of cactus plants in majolica pots." A dining room was panelled with very costly cembra pine. Hitler's large study had a telephone switchboard room. The library contained books "on history, painting, architecture and music."

A great hall was furnished with expensive Teutonic furniture, a large globe and an expansive red marble fireplace mantel. Behind one wall was a projection booth for evening screenings of films [often, Hollywood productions that were otherwise banned in Germany]. A sprawling picture window could be lowered into the wall to give a sweeping, open air view of the snow-capped mountains in Hitler's native Austria.

The house was maintained much like a small resort hotel by several housekeepers, gardeners, cooks and other domestic workers. "This place is mine," Hitler was quoted as saying to a writer for "Homes and Gardens" magazine in 1938. "I built it with money that I earned".

Hitler's personal valet Heinz Linge stated that Hitler and his longtime companion Eva Braun had two bedrooms and two bathrooms with interconnecting doors and Hitler would end most evenings alone with her in his study drinking tea.

Though Hitler did not smoke, smoking was allowed on the terrace. His vegetarian diet was supplied by nearby kitchen gardens and, later, a greenhouse. A large complex of mountain homes for the Nazi leadership with a landing strip and many buildings for their security and support staff were constructed nearby.

The Berghof became something of a German tourist attraction during the mid-1930s. Visitors gathered at the end of the driveway or on nearby public paths in the hope of catching a glimpse of Hitler. This led to the introduction of severe restrictions on access to the area and other security measures. A large contingent of the SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler were housed in barracks adjacent to the Berghof. Under the command of Obersturmbannführer Bernhard Frank, they patrolled an extensive cordoned security zone that encompassed the nearby homes of the other Nazi leaders.

With the outbreak of war extensive anti-aircraft defences were also installed, including smoke generating machines to conceal the Berghof complex from hostile aircraft. Further, the nearby former hotel 'Turken' was turned into quarters to house the Reichssicherheitsdienst (RSD) SS security men who patrolled the grounds of the Berghof.

After the Berghof was completed in 1936, the Führer liked to receive guests of state and other high-ranking personalities here in order to present himself as a major, highly respected statesman of the world. Against the majestic mountain backdrop Hitler could be portrayed as a visionary far removed from the banalities of everyday life.

Above all, Obersalzberg added to the image of the brilliant "Führer" as a man with feelings and sensibilities. The cult ostensibly lifted the veil surrounding Hitler's private life and showed him here as a simple man of the people, as a friend of children, animals and nature, as a good neighbor, in short, as a normal, warm-hearted person whom one could trust blindly. The calculated and orchestrated scenario of ordinariness and normality, which even today is mistaken by many for historical reality, was to be exposed for what it really was: subtle propaganda that aided in consolidating Hitler's personal power and his regime.

Guests at the Berghof included political figures, monarchs, heads of state and diplomats along with painters, singers and musicians. The important visitors personally greeted on the steps of the Berghof by Hitler included David Lloyd George [3 March 1936], the Aga Khan [20 October 1937], Duke and Duchess of Windsor [22 October 1937], Kurt von Schuschnigg [12 February 1938], Neville Chamberlain [15 September 1938] and Benito Mussolini [19 January 1941].

On 11 May 1941 Karlheinz Pintsch visited the Berghof to deliver a letter from Rudolf Hess informing him of his illegal flight to Scotland.

At the end of July 1941 Hitler summoned his military chiefs from OKW and OKH to the Berghof for the 'Berghof Conference' at which the 'Russian problem' was studied.

Hitler's social circle at his Berghof retreat – which his intimates referred to as "on the Berg" – included Eva Braun and her sister Gretl, Eva's friend Marianne Schönmann, Herta Schneider and her children, Heinrich Hoffmann and the wives and children of other Nazi leaders and Hitler's staff who would all pose for an annual group photograph on the occasion of Hitler's birthday. The social scene at the Berghof ended on 14 July 1944 when Hitler left for his military headquarters in East Prussia, never to return.

Two guests planned to use a visit to the Berghof as an opportunity to assassinate Hitler. On 11 March 1944 Captain Eberhard von Breitenbuch arrived with a concealed pistol with the intention of shooting Hitler in the head, but guards would not allow him into the same room. On 7 June 1944 Colonel Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg planned to detonate a bomb at a meeting there, but his fellow conspirators would not give him approval to do so because Himmler and Hermann Göring were not also present. There was also a British plan called Operation Foxley for a sniper to kill Hitler on his daily walk from the Berghof to the Teehaus.

Aerial photograph of the promenade from the Berghof to the "Teehaus"

In 1937, a Teehaus with a round main room was built in a wooded area on Mooslahnerkopf hill [Braun spelled it Moslanderkopf in photo albums], across the small Obersalzberg valley from the Berghof. Hitler took an almost daily afternoon walk there when he was at Berchtesgaden. The stroll along the mostly wooded path between the Berghof and the teahouse was less than a kilometre and at one spot featured a scenic overlook of the whole valley, fitted with wooden railings and a bench, where many widely known photographs were taken and political discussions were held. At the teahouse Hitler might even nap in an easy chair, surrounded by friends and associates from his inner circle. Most of the few surviving photographs of Hitler wearing eyeglasses were taken in the teahouse. Some sources have now and then mistakenly captioned photographs snapped in the Mooslahnerkopf Teehaus as having been shot in the spectacular Kehlsteinhaus far above the Berghof, where Hitler seldom went.

"The Führer has no Private Life" was the slogan of Nazi Propaganda

In order not to spoil the orchestrated illusion of a dictator far removed from all earthly things, so as to insinuate that the selfless Führer was sacrificing himself for German greatness, his girlfriend had to remain a secret.

This greatly increased his allure to German women, many of whom sent him love letters, presents and marriage offers.

Eva Braun was condemned to a life of secrecy. At the age of 19, she became Hitler's mistress, received a house, expensive clothes, fast cars and French perfume - but no wedding ring. Officially, she went under the name of private secretary and drew a salary from party funds. He called her "Tschapperl", she had to call him "mein Führer". When state visitors came to Hitler's chalet Berghof, she was banished to her room. Only the entourage at the estate near Berchtesgaden really knew what was going on. It was not until he faced total defeat, in the underground world of the Chancellery Bunker when the Red Army took Berlin, that he married Eva Braun. The burning of the bodies in the forecourt of the Chancellery building not only marked the end of an era of terror, but also of a relationship shrouded in mystery between the dictator and a woman whom he was prepared to marry only after taking the mutual decision to commit suicide.

The Kehlsteinhaus was to be the aiming point of an 25 April 1945 Royal Air Force bombing raid. The small house proved an elusive target for the force of 359 Avro Lancasters and 16 de Havilland Mosquitoes, with the Berghof area bombed and severely damaged instead. The Berghof was set on fire by retreating SS troops in early May, and looted after Allied troops reached the area. was demolished in 1952.

The burnt out shell ruins of the Berghof, and the houses of Göring and Bormann and the SS barracks were demolished by the Bavarian government in 1952. Only a few buildings survived, including the Kehlstein House - the "Eagle's Nest" - and the Bunker complex.

The Kehlsteinhaus [known as the Eagle's Nest in English-speaking countries] is a Third Reich-era edifice erected on a ridge atop the Kehlstein, a 1,834 m [6,017 ft] subpeak of the Hoher Göll that rises above the Obersalzberg near the town of Berchtesgaden. It lies several miles directly above the Berghof. In a rare diplomatic engagement Hitler received departing French ambassador André François-Poncet there on 18 October 1938, and the name "Eagle's Nest" came from a description of the place by him.  

It was commissioned by Martin Bormann in the summer of 1937 to be presented to Adolf Hitler on his 50th birthday, as a retreat and place to entertain friends and visiting dignitaries. Paid for by the Nazi Party, it was completed in 13 months but held until a formal presentation on 20 April 1939. In fact, Hitler seldom visited the Eagle’s Nest, as he did not like the height and the resulting changes in air pressure, and the perceived dangers of lightning and the elevator.
 
The Kehlsteinhaus was designed by architect Roderich Fick as a wooden frame structure, but it consists of 80% concrete, particularly in the area of the octagonal main hall or reception room. The outside walls, as well as the interior walls, are covered by a façade of granite stones, which gives the impression that the building is a solid stone structure. The granite stones came from a quarry near Passau.

The building's main reception room is dominated by a fireplace of red Italian marble presented by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. Much of the furniture was designed by Paul Laszlo.

Created with materials from all over Germany, the Kehlsteinhaus project made use of the best architects, engineers and workers from across the country.

It is reached via the serpent-like Kehlsteinstraße, one of the most magnificent mountain roads in the world and the highest in Germany.  It is a work of engineering that is, in the opinion of a number of experts, years ahead of its time. The techniques used for building this road became benchmarks for future projects. It  has also required minimal maintenance, which attests to the quality of workmanship.

Although the chief road inspector, Dr. Fritz Todt, gave the final OK to build the road, it was actually the state engineer August Michahelles, who planned it.

It is a 4 m [13 ft] wide approach road which climbs 800 m [2,600 ft] over 6.5 km [4.0 mi] long, and had to be blasted out of the rock and constructed at the same time as the house. It includes five tunnels but only one hairpin turn.

An elevator built into the mountain goes up to the Kehlsteinhaus. A 3-ton marble slab above the door to the tunnel, which leads to the elevator, is engraved with the words "Erbaut 1938". The door to the tunnel has handles in the shape of a lion. The interior of the elevator has solid brass walls and Venetian mirrors to make it look less confining, since Hitler was known to suffer from claustrophobia. On his infrequent visits to the Kehlsteinhaus, Hitler would stand in the exact center of the elevator.

Undamaged in the 25 April 1945 bombing raid, the Kehlsteinhaus was subsequently used by the Allies as a military command post until 1960, when it was handed back to the State of Bavaria.

The pleasant walk to the "Teehaus" often became the scene for important political decisions

Referred to as the "D-Haus", short for "Diplomatic Reception Haus", the Kehlsteinhaus is often conflated with the Mooslahnerkopf Teehaus at the Berghof, which Hitler visited daily after lunch. That teahouse no longer exists, as it was demolished by the Bavarian government after the war.

Snow covers a new four-star Inter Continental holiday resort in southern Bavarian town of Berchtesgaden. The 138-room resort opened on 1 March 2005 and is located near Adolf Hitler's former Alpine retreat, the Berghof in Obersalzberg