Tour Report: Brick Factory T.

The story of how we stumbled across this abandoned brickworks almost exactly five years ago is quite funny. A few years earlier, we had bought a small tree for our garden at a farmers' market - a "Speierling" (Cormus domestica, or sorb tree).

You have to know that our “garden” is a garage yard with lots of individual pots, and we planted the tree, which was not even half a meter high at the time, in one of these pots.

The little tree thrived magnificently and grew bigger and bigger over time. At first we planted it in a larger pot, but this eventually became too small for the tree.

We didn't have a larger pot - and as the sorb tree is one of the rarest trees in Germany (in Austria and Switzerland it is even on the list of endangered species), we wanted to place it where it would have a good and long life.

At a barbecue evening, a good friend said that there was plenty of space in her parents' garden and that they would be happy to take the tree.

So a few weeks later, we loaded the tree into our car (which was an adventure in itself) and drove towards the North Sea coast. Our friend's parents were waiting for us with a lavishly laid coffee table and even tried to fill us up with schnapps, which we gratefully declined. In any case, it was a great afternoon with lots of good conversation, and when we got talking about our hobby, our friend's father casually mentioned that there was a dilapidated brickworks just across the road.

Shortly afterwards, we set off with him (he accompanied us because he knew all the neighbors and could therefore make sure that no one called the police on us).

The brickworks was only about 5 minutes away and was really dilapidated. The chimney had either been demolished in the past or had collapsed; in any case, only a small stump was left. The ring kiln was still in good condition and had not collapsed; only some garbage had been dumped there in the past.

All that was left of the other buildings of the brickworks were a few ruined remains. Apparently the site had also been used by people at some point, who stored scrap metal and a few old agricultural machines there. In order not to try our hosts' patience too much, we only took a few photos and then headed back.

In any case, this was a nice surprice location and exploration - and our tree has since found a great new home - we still get a photo of it from time to time!

To find out a bit more about the history of the place and to check out more photos, click the button below.

Tour Report: Auto Repair Factory S. [Revisit]

In 2014, I paid my first visit to this huge abandoned factory. At the time, my wife Birthe hadn't come along, so more than five years later, we chose the place as the starting point of our summer vacation.

I had planned to take the "back door" through an open fence on the far side of the premises that I had taken five years earlier, but since it was Monday, there was too much going on in the surrounding businesses, so we had to look for another way.

We drove towards the main entrance of the abandoned factory. There was a public parking spot pretty near, so we didn't have to walk too far, which was a good thing, since it started to rain the moment we got out of the car. We walked along the fence and the walls of the factory, and after a few minutes, we found a way in. The way we used seemed to be frequented by homeless people who used this part of the factory as accommodation. We didn't want to disturb anyone, so we quickly made our way towards the factory halls.

As I remembered from my first visit, the halls were huge - some of the largest halls I have ever seen. The graffiti had become more over the years, but aside from that, nothing much had changed.

We took our time strolling through the production floor and checking out the parts on the upper floor - storage, workshops, restrooms and break rooms.

At some point, we heard a noise from the outside, and as I looked out the window, we saw a security guard walking across the yard towards the building. He hadn't seen us or anything and apparently was on a routine patrol.

We decided to not make it too difficult for him. We calmly packed our stuff, walked down the stairs into the main factory hall and waited. As he entered, we smiled and waved at him and said hi. We told him that we saw him and wanted to make his job a bit easier, so we had already gotten ready to leave.

At that point, the security guy was completely speechless. I think this was something that never happened to him before. While he walked us out, he asked us how we had gotten in, and he told us a bit about the (at the time) current plans that existed for the place.

He let us out through the main gate, we walked back to the car and drove off to the next spot.

To find out about the history of this place and to check out all the photos, click the button below.

Tour Report: Rail Yard "Ivy"

After exploring the abandoned school, we still had some time to check out one more location before we had to head home. So we drove back to the nearby city, because from there it was more or less a straight shot home on the highway. Right next to the city's main train station are the remains of the local rail yard. In earlier times, almost every larger train station had its own rail yard to conduct repairs and be able to quickly allocate locomotives and train cars. That was of course in a time when centralization of services wasn't the way to go yet. Most of the smaller rail yards had been closed towards the end of the last century in favor of large central maintenance hubs.

This particular rail yard was closed in 1998, so at the time of our exploration, it had been abandoned for more than twenty years.

As we arrived, we found a good place to park in a side road. From there, we walked a few minutes to the fence on the back of the premises and quickly discovered an opening where we could squeeze through. Since the active station was right next to the rail yard, we had to be careful not to be spotted, but the vegetation provided a little bit of cover.

Probably because of the populated area, the condition of the place was pretty good in terms of vandalism. Of course, there were a few graffiti, but there has been far less trash dumped than in similar locations that I've visited. Additionally, there was some really nice green decay, so it was a good spot to finish off our tour.

To find out about the history of this place and to check out all the photos, click the button below.

Tour Report: Railway Repair Factory "Green Desert"

In June 2019, we visited a good friend in the northeastern part of Germany, and on the second day of our weekend vacation, we went to explore a few abandoned locations.

Since the first location was only twenty minutes away, we took our time and had a nice long breakfast before leaving at around 11am.

The place was easy to find, and we quickly found a parking place that didn't kake us look suspicious. The problem was getting in. On the one sinde was an active railway area, and on the other sides were industrial buildings. There was a fence, and we hoped for an opening somewhere, but there was no way in.

We had to climb over the main gate. Of course, this was the least preferred, because most public, option, but we wanted to explore that place, so we had no choice.

Once on the premises, we didn't run into any problems and were able to take our time to explore all the remaining buildings of the old railway repair factory. It had been really dry the weeks before, but there was still beautiful green growth all over - outside of the buildings as well as inside. The old factory was in its final stages of decay. A lot of the roofs were already gone, others bravely fought against their collapse, and yet others already had collapsed, but were hanging by a thread, so to speak, to form a kind of tunnel for us to walk through.

What I found really interesting was the absence of trash. Usually, these old industrial areas are used by the locals to dump tons of trash, old furniture or unused construction materials. This was not the case here, most of the stuff lying around was just debris from the decaying buildings.

Although it was really hot (it was around noon, and it was a really sunny day), we thoroughly enjoyed our exploration of this place, and we took our time exploring every room that we could find. In the end, we climbed out undisturbed the same way we took to get in.

To find out about the history of this place and to check out all the photos, click the button below.

Tour Report: Gravel Pit "Rusty Giants" [Revisit]

Almost exactly two years after we first explored this abandoned gravel pit, we were in the area again, and we decided to go for a revisit. During our first visit, we had overlooked a few things, so we also had the chance to find something that we hadn't found before.

From our first exploration, we remembered that the place seemed to be somewhat of a local recreation area - there had been people walking their dogs, some were jogging and others were just taking a stroll with their family. We had parked right in front of the main gate, and there wasn't any problem - so this was what we expected to find for our second visit.

The weather on this Monday in November of 2018 wasn't too great; it was cloudy with a bit of rain coming down from time to time, so we weren't surprised that we didn't see anyone except us. Just like the first time, we parked right on the parking space next to the front gate, gathered our gear and began our exploration.

I have to admit that I really liked the weather, because the clouds gave a somewhat dramatic look to the large rusty machines. It was a nice atmosphere, and since there was no wind, it was also really quiet. We could hear the sand beneath our feet as we walked along the paths. After a while, we came to a branch of the way that we hadn't taken the first time, and we saw a large hall. The doors were locked, but we found a hole in the rear wall through which we entered.

In the hall, we found some really nice old vehicles that had been used in the operation of the gravel pit - a crawler excavator and two old trucks. They were still in pretty good condition, so there were another couple of photos to be taken here. In the end, we found a few more neat old machines that we hadn't discovered during our first visit, so this was definitely a success!

After we had gotten back to the car and loaded our stuff into the trunk, another car drove up right next to us, and a security guard asked us what we were doing. We told him that we had just arrived and wanted to take a look at the old gravel pit - that was something he really didn't like, and he told us that the place was off limits and we had to leave immediately, which of course we did. He even followed us in his car for about a kilometer to make sure that we were really gone.

I can imagine that not only the danger of people climbing around on the machines and falling down, but also the risk of copper thieves mistaking the operational recycling facility in the back of the area as part of the abandoned place and starting to steal stuff had been the reason to hire security guards who are patrolling the place. Well, we have seen most of it, so we were happy on our way :)

To find out about the history of this place and to check out all the photos, click the button below.

If you like to, you can check out a short video of our explore right here: