Tour Report: Hillside Hotel [Revisit]

This abandoned hotel was the final location I explored together with my friend Pixelcracker on our spontaneous tour through the mountains in October of 2017.
I had visited this place a few months earlier together with my wife, but we only explored part of it because we chickened out and didn't enter the part of the building that was affected by a fire a couple of years ago.
Pixelcracker and I used the same parking spot and access route that I'd taken the first time, and entering the hotel was just as easy. And this time, I went up the charred stairs to the first floor. It didn't really feel safe, but it obviously didn't collapse under our weight ;)
Upstairs, we found a couple of really rooms that were still in pretty good condition. The smoke from the fire had settled all over the walls and kind of swallowed a lot of the light, so the atmosphere was a bit eerie.
I was glad to have climbed up the stairs, becuase it would have been a pity not to photograph the rooms there.
After checking out the main building, we went to the adjacent buildng that had offered some great shots during my first visit. As we had climbed inside through the kitchen window, I was terrified - in only two months time, the entire place had literally been turned upside down. It didn't look like typical vandalism, because not a lot had been destroyed - but much of the furniture had been carried around the house or was lying on the floor.
I can only imagine that it was an "urbexer" who wanted to destroy the place for everyone that comes after him - it does happen in the German urbex "community". There are a lot of really jealous fellows and people that think that only they are "elite", and some of these people really do destroy places to spoil them for everyone else so that only they have the "good" photos.
I've tried to illustrate the development below.
That's what this looked like to me; it was very sad.
So after a really successful weekend of exploring, this was kind of a sad conclusion for our tour, but after all, we had seen so many great places and met so many great people, so that after almost two years, I'm still looking back on that weekend with a big smile on my face!!


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

Here are some photos that document the change of the place over a period of less than two months. Only about six weeks are between the two photos.

Tour Report: Sanatorium J. [Revisit]

As I've said a couple of posts back, it still feels weird writing about visiting this place - but I also really like looking back at my visits there, and I'm sure that my friend Pixelcracker has memories of this weekend that are just as fond as mine!
We returned to the camp from a rainy day of exploring. We had explored a couple of really cool locations and were looking forward to spending the last evening of our trip at the big campfire having barbecue and a couple of beers.
And we did exactly that. We had another great evening with really great people and we sat by the fire until it almost got too late...
After all, we had to leave pretty early the next morning, and had to get up accordingly.
But before we were going to leave, we had promised ourselves a more elaborate walk through the old sanatorium. The short explore on the night that we arrived had hardly been enough!
So we got up at around eight in the morning, had a strong coffee for breakfast and started our walk through the building.
The new day started just as the last one had ended - rainy. But the sky started clearing a little from time to time, and even a little bit of sunlight came through the clouds, so some of the photos did get a nice light. In addition, the rain had left a few puddles and pools in some of the rooms, which made for a nice mirror effect.
It took us about to hours until we had enough photos and were ready to get on the road.
We had another coffee and said goodbye and then we started heading home. There was one more location to explore on the way, so stay tuned for the next post ;)


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

Tour Report: Recreation Home H. [Revisit]

After we had explored the abandoned inn, Pixelcracker and I still had some time left before we'd planned to go grocery shopping for the evening barbecue up on the mountain.
I'd always wanted to go for a revisit of the old recreation home, but I never got the chance - up until then ;)

In addition, it wasn't too far away, so that we'd have plenty of time to get everything else done as well.

Parking had always been an issue at this location. There is no public parking area anywhere near it, and there was no possibility to park by the side of the streets leading up to the place. So we played the "RV card" again and parked on the street right in front of the building. The access was on the backside anyway, so for any passerby, it'd look like some tourists went for a hike in the woods...in the rain...

The rain hadn't stopped, but it hadn't gotten worse either, so we took our time walking along the fence around the building until we found an opening that led us to the main entrance that was wide open.

It had been more than three years since my last visit, and the condition of the old recreation home had gotten a lot worse - the roof of the large hall had collapsed, so it had become a kind of atrium. Other parts shared the same fate, especially on the upper floor, there were many rooms with massive decay. To be frank, I was surprised that the building was still standing.

Accordingly, we moved around very carefully - the rain and humidity of the days and weeks before had soaked the wooden floors, so that it felt like we were moving on soft soil or something like that. Some rooms we didn't even enter and only took photos from the doors.

After about two hours, we had explored every room that we dared to enter, and we made our way back to the car.

I was really happy to have gotten a chance to take photos of this place again - after all, the first time, we'd missed a lot, and I'm not really happy with the old photos anymore.

Our second day of exploring ended with a great barbecue over the campfire together with good friends up on the mountain - and we managed to not be as drunk as the night before. After all, we had a long drive home ahead of us the next morning ;)

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