Tour Report: Children's Home R.

We left our "Urbex Hotel" in Eastern Germany Sunday morning after a hearty breakfast. It was relatively early as we had two more locations planned for the day, and we had a bit of road ahead of us.

Our first stop after about 250 kilometers was an abandoned children's home that had been abandoned for about 17 years at the time of our visit.

When we arrived, we parked at an inconspicuous spot somewhere in the neighborhood and walked the rest of the way. It had snowed during the night, and we could clearly see fresh tire tracks leading up to the premises, so we were really careful.

As we arrived at the building, we saw a car parked right in front of it. wait a minute - that license plate looks somehow familiar...It was a friend of ours who I had told that we were planning to visit the place that day. he had decided for a spontaneous visit as well. So it was alright after all, we weren't in any danger of getting caught.

We took our time to explore the place thoroughly for about two hours before we left for the next spot.

It wasn't really spectacular and over the years, the local kids have made a mess out of the place - but the snow and the winter sun made for a nice light, so we managed to get some good shots.

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

Children's Sanatorium E.

Only three days after touring the East of Germany for an old hospital and an abandoned paper mill, my wife and I met up again with Nordgriller Urban Exploration for another tour. Only this tour was going to be a quite a bit further than the last one. For a one-day-tour anyway.
We had planned a tour of overall about 800 kilometers with two fixed locations along with a couple of alternatives.
We met up relatively early, and after the mandatory coffee and cigarette we took off to pick up another friend who was with us on this tour.
We reached our first destination shortly before noon, found it and parked the car. We checked out the surroundings first and looked for the most opportune way to enter.
The old children's sanatorium lies right in the middle of the town on top of a hill surrounded by trees. The street runs right alongside it and across the street are houses and apartments. It was Sunday and the weather was really nice, so there were a lot of cyclists passing the area. Eventually, we took the most obvious, but also quickest way in to be out of everybody's sight as quickly as possible.

Looking back, this sanatorium is one of my favorite locations, possibly due not only to the location itself, but also due to the weather and the great crew I was with once again. We took a lot of time to give the entire area a thorough exploration before we moved on to the next place.

Here are some photos to give you an impression of the 140-year-old sanatorium. To find out more about the history of the place and check out the entire gallery, click on the button below.

Sanatorium X (Part 2)

The sanatorium was taken over by the City of Hamburg in 1925 and used as a children's hospital until in 1945, short after the war, the hospital was nationalized by the East German government.
The hospital was closed after the German reunification in 1990 and has been abandoned ever since.

From the entrance hall we went into the building, only to find it in a desolate shape. Vandalism and decay have taken their toll.
A lot of the stairs are pretty unstable and some of the floors are starting to move beneath your feet.

But the green trees outside, the windows, the doors  and the decay on the walls made for some really nice scenes.

Part 1 | Part 2

Sanatorium X

Why Sanatorium X?
Well, at the time of our visit, we had no idea which sanatorium this was. The region in which this object is located has a wealth of abandoned places, and a lot of these are sanatoriums.

Most of them were built at the end of the 19th century and have lived through turbulent times that led to a lot of name changes for these places, so if your research is not accurate enough, it's pretty easy to stumble onto something and not know what it is.
This was the case here.

Of course, I found out shortly after our visit, but unitl then, I had to store the photos on my hard drive and find a name for the folder. I called it "Sanatorium X", and when it came to finding a title for this post, I decided to stick with the name.

Anyway, this sanatorium was built at the very end of the 19th century. In the year 1903, it had a capacity of 32 patients, which was raised to 90 over the years. The building was continually expanded, starting with the first expansion in 1903, the next in 1907 and one more in 1914.

We first went around the building and checked out the area. Part of the building has already collapsed, but the remaining part looked safe enough for a trip inside.

The first part we entered were some adjacent parts. The sanatorium was closed almost 25 years ago, and time, vandals and copper thieves haven't been kind to the old hospital.

But there was no way into the main building through these rooms, so we found a different way in.
The entrance had some really nice details. Especially the tiles on the walls were really cool.

Form there we made our way into the rest of the building.
Stay tuned for more pictures from this beautiful place. I promise you lots of decay!

Part 1 | Part 2

The Abandoned Children's Hospital (Part 4)

Now for the final post about the children's hospital.
Only ten years after the new ward was completed, the hospital was closed down on Jauary 1,1997.
Since then, the buildings have been exposed to weather and vandalism, almost nothing is left of the original architectural beauty.
Eight years ago, hope arose that things would become better: The state had sold the buildings to a Russian investor who wanted to build a big health care center with a clinic as well as conference and research facilities.
Until today, nothing happened.
Speculations say that the Russian owners are deliberately letting the buildings decay to go around the monument protection before building anything new.

Here are the couple of last pictures I took during my visit.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

The Abandoned Children's Hospital (Part 3)

In 1920, the municipality was incorporated into the city west of it and the "Milk-Treatment-Facility" was separated from the hospial soon after that and became the city's property.
The facility became the nucleus of the city's new milk industry.
Later in the 20th century, the hospital complex expanded and in 1985, construction began on a completely new ward which was opened in 1987.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3