Although our first stop was the "Südgelände", a nature preserve and abandoned railroad area, the trip to the abandoned hospital in Beelitz-Heilstätten outside of Berlin was much more memorable.
The entire complex consists of more than 60 buildings erected between 1898 and 1930 to care for the victims of the tuberculosis epidemic in Berlin. The whole thing is being patrolled by security to keep out vandals, but there are photo excursions available at go2know.de in which a couple of the buildings are unlocked and free to explore for several hours.
Here is the first selection of photos I took.
You can also check out Ghost Hospital Part 2 and Ghost Hospital Part 3.
After 1945, the Red Army took control of the hospital complex and until 1994, it was the Soviet Union's largest military hospital outside of the USSR and in 1990 was the last home of Erich Honecker, former head of government of Eastern Germany.
The hospital is huge and full of seemingly neverending corridors:
Most of the windows are boarded shut, which makes for a lot of interesting light effects. The weather was perfect, because the sun was really playing with the shapes of the windows.
I don't want to make this post too long, but there is so much more material, so there will be a part two soon.
