Tour Report: Hotel N.

While reasearching for the tour we started with the exploration of the abandoned recreation home, I had found some large buildings that looked abandoned and interesting, but I hadn't been able to find out what it was or if it was in fact abandoned.
So we decided to incorporate it into the tour and make it our second lcoation of the day.
As we drove up to the building, it became obvious that it was very abandoned - and probably heavily vandalized. But - if you're there, you go check it out, and that's what we did.
We parked almost right in front of the spot (there was no other parking spot anywhere) and went through a huge hole in the fence.
As soon as we entered, it was clear that this was an old hotel. Historically, I can't say if it was a hotel or recreation home during the German separation or if it was maybe even military barracks and became a hotel only after the reunification.
Anyway, we started our walkthrough. The vandalism was heavy and it appeared as if not only metal thieves have had their share...almost all the standard size windows had been removed - including the frames! I suspect that either the local population or construction companies from Poland or elsewhere have taken them out to sell or reuse them.
At one point of our exploration, we heard a car arrive and park. Shortly after that, we heard someone walk over the premises and enter the building, so we held our breath and waited what was happening next. After a little while, we started hearing an angle grinder. That went on for about ten minutes, followed by a couple of minutes of silence.
Then, we heard a loud scraping sound accompanied by heavy breathing and cursing. The sound came from one side of the building, went through the building and came out the other side.
As we looked out through the window, we saw an older guy drag a heavy metal door across the open field towards his car. Every couple of meters, he stopped to catch his breath and cursed at the heavy door. When he arrived at his car, he loaded the door into the car and just drove off.
It was a weird, but also funny experience - and seeing this guy supported the theory that the regional populace uses the materials from this old builöding for construction purposes...


To check out all the photos from this vandalized little place, click the button below.

Tour Report: Recreation Home L.

On a cold and snowy morning in the middle of January of last year, Freddy from Nordgriller Urbex, my wife and myself started the first tour of 2017.
We had a pretty long drive ahead of us, since we had planned a two-day trip with an overnight stay at a friend's place so we could fit in more locations.
The first spot was an abandoned recreation home on an island in Eastern Germany.
I had only seen it on Google Earth, but hadn't found any photos that indicated the status of decay, so we had to check it out for ourselves.
Upon our arrival, we could already see that the state of most of the buildings was desolate. Roofs and walls collapsed, wood partly burned...in combination with the bleak weather, it was a sad sight.
Nonetheless, we decided to give it a shot, grabbed our gear and walked onto the premises. No fence or signs were there to indicate a restricted area.
It became apparent that our initial perception was correct. Years of weather and vandalism have taken a huge toll on the facility - but we still managed to get a couple of acceptable shots together, so that our visit here hadn't been a complete failure. Looking back, it was a nice start for the tour and a good one to warm up on.


To check out all the photos from this rotten little place and find out about its history, click the button below.

Tour Report: Military Hospital

We got so caught on this one... It was a cold morning in late December of 2016 when Freddy from Nordgriller Urbex picked me up to explore an abandoned military hospital.
I will not go into the details of this endeavor, but after being caught and talked to by six armed civilian guards and the military officer of the watch (overall four vehicles and eight armed guards), still getting off the hook in the end was a stressful, yet satisfying, experience.
The hospital itself was a really cool place. The weather wasn't too good, but we still spent about five hours exploring all the buildings - it was really worth the long trip!


To check out all the photos from this neat little place, click the button below.

Tour Report: The Farm of Cars

This place was the second and final spot of our X-Mas Exploration in 2016. After successfully exploring the old chalk pit, we drove for about 45 minutes until we got to this place.
I had gotten a tip that there were old cars to be discovered, so we had decided to check it out.
We parked a little down the road, yet far enough from the neighbors' house as not to attract any attention. The wind blew fierce, so we hurried to get into the house, and we quickly found an open door by the side of the main building.
The house itself was pretty ramshackle and had been vandalized, so there weren't too many shots to be taken there. But the barn and the back yard did hold some automotive tresures for us, so to speak. Nothing spectacular, but nice to look at, and the red 1955 Peugeot 403 was really nice to look at.

As we were packing our stuff back into the car when we were done, a little girl (probably the neighbor's daughter) approached us and asked what we were doing. We told her that we were taking photos of the old building because we are fascinated by "old stuff". She asked more questions in a way that made the questions feel kind suspicious. We suspected that she was sent by the neighbor - possibly the owner of the place - to check if we were looking for criminal things such as illegal waste disposal or something...
Anyway, after this short episode, we drove home and were back just in time for coffee :)


To check out all the photos from this neat little place, click the button below.

New Video: Heaven's Cave

Hey guys! Last Sunday, my wife and I drove to the Harz mountains for a short vacation. Naturally, we had planned to visit a couple of spots, and the first one also turned out to be the most exciting.
It was a large cave discovered in the 1860s during work on a railway tunnel.

Of course, there will be a detailed report of our cave exploration, but for now, you can watch the short video that I made that day.
Check it out! And don't forget to regularly visit my facebook-page to stay up to date with our current explores!

Tour Report: Chalk Pit S.

It was the second day of the Christmas holidays in 2016 and it was time for our third annual X-Mas-Exploration. Since 2014, my wife and I used the second day of Christmas to go on a tour together with my mother-in-law.
Following the tradition we had established, we drove West towards the North Sea. During my research, I had found a possible spot - an abandoned chalk pit. It seemed like a nice place to start; quite possibly easily accessible and - so to speak - a nice walk in the park to get us all in the mood.
The weather was pretty changeable; sunny periods switched places with patches of rain coming in, and a stiff winter wind came from the West and blew the salty air from the North sea far inland.
Upon arrival, the rain had stopped and the sun had actually come out. We parked the car a bit down the road and walked to a hole in the fence that we had spotted on the way in.
The rain had turned the chalk on the ground into a kind of plaster-like mud that clung to our shoes, so we had to make our way through the less muddy overgrown parts.

The chalk pit has was shut down about fifteen years ago, and most of the  equipment has been removed, but there were still some nice details to be found - and the landscape looked great in the winter sun.
Toward the end of our walkthrough, the rain started again, and the clouds told a story of more rain to come, so we climbed up the stairs next to the old conveyor belt to get back on ground level.
When we reached the car, the raining had turned into puring and we were glad to have a roof over our heads.
We had about 45 minutes to drive to the next location, and we hoped that this time would be enough for the rain to seize and the sun to come back out.


To find out more about the history of this nice open air location and to check out all the photos, click the button below.