Well! Where do I begin?! January might be a good idea! What a turbulent year its been for me. I have lapsed in the last few years on explore frequency but Northern_Ninja, an exploring partner of mine certainly helped get numbers up again, A personally upsetting situation which in itself multiplied my exploring numbers and continues to be of emotional strain on me deep down, but exploring cures all.
2013 was also the year I finally got to see Chernobyl and Pripyat, a place which has left me emotionally changed inside, a place which is hard to stomach and makes me remember how lucky I am in life. I would have been one of the last people who got to see it before its demise.
It was the year I reported on a lot of sites that were halfway through demo and I caught right at the last minute. Sites which brewed up a storm in their local area and pulled in probably hundreds of thousands of views from customers of old.
I covered a lot of ground I had hoped to in all my years of urbex, finally cracked A certain Power Station, and Denbigh, and also did my first Northern trip and covered a lot of ground in and around Manchester.
2013 certainly did have some ups, some downs, some mehs some yays, but in urbex terms it was pretty damn epic!
_____________________________________________________________________
Off to a slow start to the year we have this report from March:
Shredded Wheat Factory, Wewlyn Garden City (UK)
This had been on my to do list for as long as I can remember, here they made Shredded Wheat cereal until 2008 where it was produced elsewhere. No Nitting Nanas here….
#1
#2
#3
Onto April 2013:
G.P.S.S. Fuel Depot, Islip (UK)
I avoided this place for a few years as it had long been sealed. Here fuel was stored and supplied through pipelines for the RAF. The site was operated by Esso and closed gradually between 1998 and 2004
#4
#5
Still in the month of April we go onto a rather controversial site!
Crookham Court School, Berkshire (UK)
This was a really nice place, though pretty chilly inside! A lot intact and a lot not so intact. It’s served several purposes: a manor house, a junior school and a school for children of people serving at Greenham Common. It faced abandonment and then reopening, and was used as a boarding school until 1990, after which point it was apparently used as apartments (although this isn’t too obvious from looking at the place) and has been abandoned since 2007; the school shutdown due to “inappropriate behavior” from teachers.
#6
#7
#8
The slow kick off of 2013 continues into June
Great Gaddesden Water Tower (UK)
Very little on this place, but it had nice views and some photogenic stuff inside.
#9
So we remain in June and hop onboard a WizzAir Airbus at Luton and fly 1,500 miles East
Chernobyl and Pripyat, Kyivs'ka oblast (Ukraine)
Men and woman the world over should know about the 1986 meltdown of Reactor 4 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in The Soviet Union. 40,000 people were evacuated from Pripyat and around 150,000 in total. The still radioactive area remains uninhabitable but safe enough for regulated tours.
This place will forever remain in my heart, the modern youth of today are so wrapped up and secure they will never realise that if the Plant Workers and Liquidators hadn’t reacted with such speed, they would not even be on this planet.
#10
#11
#12
#13
#14
#15
Please read my full blog here:
http://opacity.us/forum/index.php?topic=15747.0
So still in June we head to a site that’s been on my cards for many years
North Wales Hospital, Denbigh (UK)
The North Wales Hospital (locally known as Denbigh Mental) was a hospital for people with psychiatric illnesses located in Denbigh, North Wales..
Designed to originally accommodate between 60 and 200 patients, the building dates back to 1848; it was closed in sections from 1991 to 2002, but the majority seems to have sat derelict since 1994/95.
#16
#17
#18
Onto July 2013!
Inov8/Testing Facility, Bucks (UK)
This place appeared to be some sort of test facility for the local university and has been closed since about 2008. Our trip was cut short when the caretaker saw us.
#19
#20
Fast forward onto August
Flamingos/The Empire Night Club, Milton Keynes (UK)
Rumor had it that a 90s style complex was being demolished in Milton Keynes; equipped with a Night Club, Bowling Alley and Ice Rink. I braved the rain; the Bowling Alley had gone and the Ice Rink was sealed. I managed to get into the night club and little did I know this was going to draw in probably hundreds of thousands of Flickr views from punters of old.
The club opened in 1990 and closed in 2004, leading to a slow demise seemingly synonymous to out of city leisure parks. People want to park up, ice skate and have a decent meal, they don’t want to grab some cheap burger, ice skate, then go home…
#21
#23
Onto September!
Fujitsu Building, Herts(UK)
This has been on my radar for sometime. The inside of the 70s block it was trashed entirely since its 2007 closure and left only good views from the roof.
#24
#25
Planet Ice, Milton Keynes (UK)
Its three weeks later and I hear that the ice rink in the same complex is now accessible! Its three weeks on and looking at those machines I didn’t expect much. I was wrong, it was nice and intact!
Planet Ice was the last of the business’ to close in the Milton Keynes Leisure Plaza and closed its doors in July 2013. I believe it has moved to a temporary site as the new centre is being built.
This was another set of photos which pulled in tens of thousands of views from Milton Keynes.
#26
#27
#28
From here on my life hit a bit of an emotional brick wall and I properly hit the urbex like never before to keep myself occupied.
We are now in October
Oriental City, London (UK)
A site I have wanted to do but been put off with stories of raging dogs and baseball bats… I visited here as a child and wanted to see it in its abandoned form. Oriental City was an Asian Cash and Carry and closed in 2008.
Many things have been filmed here since closure, including “Dredd”
#29
#30
END OF PART 1 DO NOT DELETE
2013 was also the year I finally got to see Chernobyl and Pripyat, a place which has left me emotionally changed inside, a place which is hard to stomach and makes me remember how lucky I am in life. I would have been one of the last people who got to see it before its demise.
It was the year I reported on a lot of sites that were halfway through demo and I caught right at the last minute. Sites which brewed up a storm in their local area and pulled in probably hundreds of thousands of views from customers of old.
I covered a lot of ground I had hoped to in all my years of urbex, finally cracked A certain Power Station, and Denbigh, and also did my first Northern trip and covered a lot of ground in and around Manchester.
2013 certainly did have some ups, some downs, some mehs some yays, but in urbex terms it was pretty damn epic!
_____________________________________________________________________
Off to a slow start to the year we have this report from March:
Shredded Wheat Factory, Wewlyn Garden City (UK)
This had been on my to do list for as long as I can remember, here they made Shredded Wheat cereal until 2008 where it was produced elsewhere. No Nitting Nanas here….
#1
#2
#3
Onto April 2013:
G.P.S.S. Fuel Depot, Islip (UK)
I avoided this place for a few years as it had long been sealed. Here fuel was stored and supplied through pipelines for the RAF. The site was operated by Esso and closed gradually between 1998 and 2004
#4
#5
Still in the month of April we go onto a rather controversial site!
Crookham Court School, Berkshire (UK)
This was a really nice place, though pretty chilly inside! A lot intact and a lot not so intact. It’s served several purposes: a manor house, a junior school and a school for children of people serving at Greenham Common. It faced abandonment and then reopening, and was used as a boarding school until 1990, after which point it was apparently used as apartments (although this isn’t too obvious from looking at the place) and has been abandoned since 2007; the school shutdown due to “inappropriate behavior” from teachers.
#6
#7
#8
The slow kick off of 2013 continues into June
Great Gaddesden Water Tower (UK)
Very little on this place, but it had nice views and some photogenic stuff inside.
#9
So we remain in June and hop onboard a WizzAir Airbus at Luton and fly 1,500 miles East
Chernobyl and Pripyat, Kyivs'ka oblast (Ukraine)
Men and woman the world over should know about the 1986 meltdown of Reactor 4 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in The Soviet Union. 40,000 people were evacuated from Pripyat and around 150,000 in total. The still radioactive area remains uninhabitable but safe enough for regulated tours.
This place will forever remain in my heart, the modern youth of today are so wrapped up and secure they will never realise that if the Plant Workers and Liquidators hadn’t reacted with such speed, they would not even be on this planet.
#10
#11
#12
#13
#14
#15
Please read my full blog here:
http://opacity.us/forum/index.php?topic=15747.0
So still in June we head to a site that’s been on my cards for many years
North Wales Hospital, Denbigh (UK)
The North Wales Hospital (locally known as Denbigh Mental) was a hospital for people with psychiatric illnesses located in Denbigh, North Wales..
Designed to originally accommodate between 60 and 200 patients, the building dates back to 1848; it was closed in sections from 1991 to 2002, but the majority seems to have sat derelict since 1994/95.
#16
#17
#18
Onto July 2013!
Inov8/Testing Facility, Bucks (UK)
This place appeared to be some sort of test facility for the local university and has been closed since about 2008. Our trip was cut short when the caretaker saw us.
#19
#20
Fast forward onto August
Flamingos/The Empire Night Club, Milton Keynes (UK)
Rumor had it that a 90s style complex was being demolished in Milton Keynes; equipped with a Night Club, Bowling Alley and Ice Rink. I braved the rain; the Bowling Alley had gone and the Ice Rink was sealed. I managed to get into the night club and little did I know this was going to draw in probably hundreds of thousands of Flickr views from punters of old.
The club opened in 1990 and closed in 2004, leading to a slow demise seemingly synonymous to out of city leisure parks. People want to park up, ice skate and have a decent meal, they don’t want to grab some cheap burger, ice skate, then go home…
#21
#23
Onto September!
Fujitsu Building, Herts(UK)
This has been on my radar for sometime. The inside of the 70s block it was trashed entirely since its 2007 closure and left only good views from the roof.
#24
#25
Planet Ice, Milton Keynes (UK)
Its three weeks later and I hear that the ice rink in the same complex is now accessible! Its three weeks on and looking at those machines I didn’t expect much. I was wrong, it was nice and intact!
Planet Ice was the last of the business’ to close in the Milton Keynes Leisure Plaza and closed its doors in July 2013. I believe it has moved to a temporary site as the new centre is being built.
This was another set of photos which pulled in tens of thousands of views from Milton Keynes.
#26
#27
#28
From here on my life hit a bit of an emotional brick wall and I properly hit the urbex like never before to keep myself occupied.
We are now in October
Oriental City, London (UK)
A site I have wanted to do but been put off with stories of raging dogs and baseball bats… I visited here as a child and wanted to see it in its abandoned form. Oriental City was an Asian Cash and Carry and closed in 2008.
Many things have been filmed here since closure, including “Dredd”
#29
#30
END OF PART 1 DO NOT DELETE
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