The second location we visited during our summer vacation in 2020 was the well-known “Car Sculpture Park” in Neandertal near Düsseldorf.
This is not an abandoned place, but a legally accessible open-air "museum" where a somewhat eccentric car dealer has been letting fifty classic cars from 1950 rot away since 2000.
We visited the place together with my cousin, who kindly let us stay at his house for the first few days of our vacation. Peter is very interested in our hobby and not only accompanied us to Neandertal during our stay, but also to another location—more on that in the next post.
The car sculpture park is located directly opposite the Neanderthal Museum, which usually makes it difficult to find a parking space. Fortunately, we arrived quite early in the day, so we were able to snag a parking space right next to the park entrance.
We paid the admission fees, which are graded according to whether you just want to look around, take photos with your cell phone, or take pictures with a “real” camera.
The 20,000-square-meter site offered a wealth of motifs from the world of luxury cars, so to speak:
A stretch of steep racing track on which historic Jaguars and Porsches compete in one last eternal race. A remnant of the Soviet world power, a Moskovich built in 1950, symbolizes half-buried the demise of its country.
A piece of the Berlin Wall, with the original graffiti - and in East and West an army car of the two worlds from 1950 decaying in the face of time. An 11 CV, the gangster limousine that belonged to a French police chief for decades. Some cars have been entwined by tree roots, others have been cut in half as trees have grown through them.
Unfortunately, the grounds filled up very quickly with people (it was a Sunday), making it difficult to take pictures without people in them, but with a little patience, it was possible to capture most of the subjects in peace.
The museum is only open for three hours—with more time, I'm sure I could have photographed even more perspectives. But even so, it was a great experience, and I can well imagine visiting this place again sometime to see how the cars have changed since our visit.
To find out more about the history and to check out all the photos from this place, click the button below.