Urbex News - December 2013 - January 2014

Happy New Year ! The rains coming down, the hangover is lingering and your boss wants you back at work any day, if not tomorrow !!

So settle down with your cup of tea, put your feet up and have some links to kill a few minutes, whilst avoiding the Daily Mail.

So first off we hop over the water to the Emerald Isle with some abandoned mines in Ireland with The Journal.

Boing Boing has an interesting article on the rise of the graffiti hunters that use Instagram whilst out on the mooch.

Over to Russia on the hunt for the truth behind the Metro 2 underground via Russia BTH.

Back over to England and we have details of an explore of Drake' Island, from The Herald, I'm sure I could spend a good few days pottering around this one.

 The New Statesman has an article on the long forgotten Victorian Hyperloop system in London, this article alone could send you off at a tangent for hours.

Oh my, the BBC have a video, its an interview with the authors of Sate of Decay.

And finally for your consideration, Google Glass - the release date is nearly upon us, will it change everything ?? Info from International Digital Times.

Until next time....

Urbex News - November, December 2013

Another monthly round up of general news and links, new and improved and avoiding anything Daily Mail.

So lets start off with a few bits and bobs from Chernobyl, first off the protective shield takes shape - designed to last a 100 years whilst people carry on scratching their heads with what the fuck do about a problem like Chernobyl.

The Moscow Times reports on hunting down the wild wolves of Chernobyl that are now on the prowl and attacking.

I came face to face with a pack of wolves on my trip, thankfully in a cage, but I have to say they were livid and scary beastly fuckers, didn't help our friendly armed and pissed up soldier friend Mikhaylov tried shoving myself and Urban Spaceman in the cage - but we lived.

Pripyat is now on a "streetview" type thing - you may have seen this, but hey its a nice potter.

Moving on to exploration of derp in Scotland, with an article from the Scotsman Newspaper.

Onto the fallen Lancashire mill town of Rochdale with the Manchester Evening News reporting on the hidden River Roch that runs under the town.

Darmen Richter explores an abandoned Soviet circus in Moldova in one of his many, many travels.

Wastlelands hidden in busy cities, worth a look see over at on the Cracked website.

Hidden Batman street art anyone ? I love stumbling across treasure like this.
 
Until next time....

Urbex News - October - November 2013

Thought twice about this post, being that over the last month or so the Daily Fail has blitzed their paper and website with articles, I'm not a fan of the Fail, but the stories just kept came thick and fast.

Hmmmm, problems, the stories, the articles, lent towards sites that are a little bit special, the sites that... well should be photographed and not vandalized or wrecked or stripped of contents, metal etc, etc, etc - many of the Daily Fail articles simply just omitted a postcode possibly giving the vandals and thieves an open goal for rampage.

I know I do name places on my blog, but certain places I just don't, such as this one, or this one - and others.

A big backlash and all manner of fallout continues against the sellout photographers for a shitty newspaper which many consider to be a scum newspaper of venomous output.

So here is a few snippets from the last month, I have left most the "special" sites out of my round up.

In fact let us just start with an interesting article on Chernobyl, or more importantly The Arch, in this from the Independent.

Rooftopping in Toronto sounds like fun, but call me a wus but I've stayed at the Holiday Inn on Kings in Toronto (now Hyatt) and trust me you don't wanna do this - I got the wobbles just looking out my bedroom window - Independent. 

- Note to Holiday Inn, still not forgiven you for allowing me to book a hotel room without telling me anything about the striking staff and having to cross a raging picket line every time you enter or leave the hotel.

Now I would love to be a fly on the wall when this chap gets caught somewhere he shouldn't be with his
chello ?!??! High brow musical urbex shenanigans from the Telegraph.

Learn to be a urban explorer in Chicago - warning you may get beat up? The Depaulia.

More Bradley Garrett from the Metro - this chap got slightly less publicity than Doctor Who in the last month.

A charming lad I know went for a potter around the old Burnley Empire Theatre and the local rag Lancashire Telegraph has an rather explosive headline.

Sylvain Margaine goes for an explore in the Telegraph, with a little write up and some jolly nice pictures - "having outwitted many a security guard".

Urban exploration in Japan with Jordy Meow from the Huffington Post, which is nice....

I was going to put a few links to Daily Mail articles, but hey, meh ! Scum Bags !!!!!!!!!!!!

Till next time....

October Urbex News - October 2013

News for September was fast and flowing, so here is my round up of stuff running from the last few days of September and early October.

First off over to Yorkshire with the Independent, and a time capsule of a country hotel, abandoned for three decades.

The Daily Fail's "undercover" urban explorer goes wandering round a closed military hospital and gets on its high horse about the waste of tax payers money - memo to Paul Dacre, stop editing a vile shit rag of a paper and do something about it, the country is littered with places like this - write about it instead of kicking the BBC and politicians dead dads.

For some strange reason the next story comes from Business Insider of Australia.

Darmon Richter, is individual who seems to creep from country to country writing his journals and this report is of a country that the world forgot, Transnistria,still stuck in a 1980's Soviet time bubble. My pal Tin Dog so wants to go here early next year, but  Darmon did it first (I still owe for that translation).

Under New York, NPR tells the story of Steve Duncan with a nice write up, together with photos and bonus audio.

Daily Fail on "eerie" wartime tunnels, involves use of word Hilter and Nazi (Daily Fail favorites)

Spooky treehouse time, a la Treehouse of Terror, IO9, rather nice.

Bradley Garrett hit all the papers with interviews and details of his forthcoming book (now out as I finally write this) and every paper and the Daily Fail got in on the act, so some variations on the theme.

First stop the Guardian, I'm a bit of a Guardian fan to be honest. The Mirror steps in with a nice gallery of photos from the book, not really known for its interest in urban exploration. Even the daily free paper Metro featured an article, as did the Daily Beast.

The Scottish Daily Record also get in on the act, But then some backlash reports from the Scottish, looks like they don't like him crossing the border and a bit of a Garrett bashing from the Daily Record.

Finally, yes I have ordered the book and it should be hitting my doormat 8th October (which it didn't, thanks Amazon - I see the free postage they offer now means they sit on an order for days rather than simply posting 2nd class post).

One from the Daily Fail, American theatres, nice.

Until next time....

Bad Weather - Urbex Boredom Relief

Well the weather is going to be terrible over the next few days so here is some time killing links to keep your urban exploring peckers up.

Sat here watching I Am Legend with Mrs Fraggle Hunter, a little pissed off the Autumn weather is going to be shocking over the next few days.

First off Anthony Bourdain, I've become rather a fan of this guy after watching this initial episode I stumbled across. Mr Bourdain travels to the Ukraine and visits Chernobyl and Pripyat. I watched this after my visit, but to be honest I picked up a few little snippets I didn't know.



Well worth a watch, as are many of Anthony |Bourdain's travel videos.

I've posted to this next link before, the link is still live, Urban Explorers: Into the Darkness, a feature length film well worth a watch.

Anyone who follows my news updates of urban exploring may want to have a gander at these - the stories are flowing this month.

First one from the Daily Mail with an explore round a Cambridge military hospital, sorry its the Daily Fail but they are currently obsessed with urban exploring.

Crazy Russian dudes hang off high buildings on Yahoo News - not my cup of tea despite my flying and jumping out of planes to be very honest.

Sadly the Daily Mail again, please newspapers post some exploring storys, we hate the fail, but over to Washington USA with a Mail fetish ghost town.

Over and out - more soon darlings.


 

September Urbex News part 2 - errrm again Sept 2013

Busy busy this month with lots of interesting nuggets so here we have a further news installment for September 2013.

First off not so much urbex related but a bit of street art with the Manchester Evening News featuring my mooching ground of Stevenson Square, Manchester.

Next up the derelict housing estate used in the television series Shameless gets torched by the local scroates and we head back again to the Manchester Evening News for details and photos - I should add the MEN have either got a new camera or a new photographer.

An old favourite on the "permission visit" circuit is Hulme Hippodrome which is featured in the Daily Mail, you might want to skip back in time to December 2011 with a similar article from the Manchester Evening News.

- readers wishing to avoid visiting the Daily Mail website can hop to Canada's Star Pheonix.

Speaking of the Daily Fail, this article on the closed Camelot theme park was featured 2nd September and is more of a historical item, when we popped by in back in June this year a lot of the park had been dismantled and shipped of to other parks around the country - the water slides went to Gulliver's World at least a week before we visited.

Must say it looks like a good gig flogging pics to the Mail, but I've seen better shots of the fallen Camelot, a lot better.

Time to get all covered in shit down in the sewers of London, an interesting article from the London Evening Standard, sewers always interest me but the fear of me constantly throwing up and gagging on the fumes as the festering turds sail on past really does put me off such strange pastimes.

- definition of pastime - An activity that occupies one's spare time pleasantly.

Speaking of pastimes, the cinema going public may have an exploration film to look forward to, according to The Hollywood Reporter the exploits of Bradley L. Garrett are to be made into an action thriller, the film will be adapted from the GQ article of March of this year Excuse Us Whilst We Kiss The Sky.

Finally we get to look thru the keyhole of Albion House, Liverpool - ex home of the White Star Line, soon to be a Titanic themed hotel, articles from Liverpool Echo and the Liverpool Confidential

Good evening and goodnight.

 

September Urbex News - errrr September 2013

First off some underground news, off to The Guardian with Roman tunnels being mapped under Rome.

Canadian ghost towns anyone ? The Toronto Star has an interesting article on ghost towns around Ontario, the article does go on to say that "urban explorers break into abandoned buildings" - No one I know breaks into buildings - but I'm sure it does go on, but it might just be a Canadian thing ??

Blimey you see some news on a ghost town and another one turns up, this time the French town of Goussainville-Vieux features in an article in the Independent

Whilst trying to avoid the Daily Mail, up comes photos of a German abandoned mansion on Fearnet, you may have seen this place before, but all rather good.

Most urban explorers I know are simply nosey photographers - we don't have get a bad press at times, mostly by the local rags these days. The large majority of  us are history and heritage buffs and a good many being dark tourists - where this story falls is open to debate, but history should not allow us to forget the brutality of war - particularly with the brave participants of World War 2 numbering less day by day. The French village of Oradour-sur-Glane features in this Guardian article.The scene of a wartime atrocity with the slaying of 642, places like this need to be preserved - but in these times of austerity will they be saved ?

Finally on to the Daily Mail, with Toxeth Reservoir, a must read, in fact read this one instead in the Times of Mumbai.

Sadly we do have to return to the Daily Mail again for this story of a Chinese ghost town that arose from flood waters after 5 years.

- I'm trying to avoid the Daily Mail if possible as I find it a vile and nasty paper in many of its other articles.

Finally some news on my crew, Urban Spaceman has today issued the following shocking statement "we need some better gigs. We have been doing shit holes recently"

- No shit Sherlock, piss poor preparation on all fronts (including me).

 

Urbex News Round Up - August 2013

Sadly many of these are taken from the Daily Mail, not my favorite newspaper - the Daily Fail as many call it now seems to have fallen in head over heels in love with urban exploration over the last few months.

So here we go with the shit and not so shit snippets you may have missed in the world of mooching and photography.

First off men go mad in a cave (sorry ladies may have joined in???) with the 28 Days Later mob going mad for spilling the beans on an exploration area and bat lovers go batty on the disturbance of bats - lots of angry voices and threats of animal protection prosecution stuff. Basically the Daily Mail loved it and got all excited, 28DL got all forum-ish and the bat lovers got all of a flutter, read for yourself but the pictures I think are most excellent.

Back to the Daily Mail again and this one hit all the right spots for the Mail, an abandoned railway station of the Nazis, with a top secret hidden research laboratory - the Mail seems to like a good anything that has any remote link to Nazis story.

For a bit of balance an nice little feature from the BBC on Severalls Hospital, the infamous Colchester Asylum.

Now here is one you don't come across everyday, Indian Urbex, a mooch round an old powerstation and its rather good.

Daily Mail hits the back of the net again with a article on Fordlandia

Over to Chicago, as WGN-TV run a feature on urban exploration and users of Instragram

The Telegraph takes a pictorial look at the subject of Dark Tourism sites from around the world, Fukushima anyone ? anyone ?

Finally the Daily Mail, again, with Lancaster Moor Asylum 

- That's your lot.


 

Meh to the Royal baby - Urbex in the papers June/July 2013

Royal baby overload ??? Lets have a round up of some recent mildly interesting urbex reads in the papers.

First off America in Ruins in the Guardian, States Of Decay, confirming that its not just Detroit that has all the derp of America

Another link this time from Denver confirming again that its not just Detroit sitting rotting, in this article about a disused airport.

Oh dear Detroit time again - after the recent location filming for the new Robocop film property developers are now looking to purchase the old Packard Plant

America scores again with this article in the Daily Mail, an old spooky asylum in New York, well not that spooky to be honest but the Daily Mail seems to be strangely addicted to urban exploration at the moment.

Urban Exploration goes legit - so it says here, I got bored reading this one.

Haunted ghost hotel, oh my !! Japan - we don't get to hear enough about Japan.

Blimey, its back to the Daily Mail again using fancy mildly titillating words such as top secret, hidden, codenamed - its Nazi bunker time !!!

Shanghai and rooftop stuff - not for me to be honest.

Finally, local news, late news (you have missed the shows) but Massive Attack and Adam Curtis staged shows in Manchester's long disused Mayfield Railway Station.

- The Guardian have 360 degree spinny thingy thing here of part of the Mayfield building

Hope that distracted you from this Prince Thingy story for a few moments relief.