THE JEEP OF MISHIMA TUNNEL [JP]

Exploration #273 The jeep of Mushima Tunnel. The Mishima Tunnel is an abandoned passage hidden along an old mountain road that once connected Kimitsu City and Kamogawa City in Chiba Prefecture. Completed in 1953, the tunnel was originally built as part of a remote forest road intended to link the inland communities of Kimitsu and Kamogawa.

Construction was difficult: the planned route crossed rugged terrain, and the soft rock surrounding the tunnel required full concrete reinforcement. Funding was so limited that the village reportedly sold off nearly all of its forest land, eventually even advertising the sale of the Kiwadadai plantation in local newspapers, to secure enough money to finish the project. For decades, the Mishima Tunnel served as a vital connection through the mountains, until the opening of the modern Kimikamo Tunnel on February 24, 1993. With the new route in operation, the old road and the Mishima Tunnel were abandoned.

Today, the remains of this forgotten road tell a mixed story. On the south (Kamogawa) side, the old approach is blocked by barriers but still relatively intact, aside from a small landslide area that poses some danger. It remains passable on foot. The north (Kimitsu) side, however, has fallen into deep neglect, overgrown with dense vegetation and barely recognizable as a former roadway. Both entrances of the tunnel are now sealed. At the Kimitsu-side portal lies one of the site’s most striking features: the heavily decayed shell of what appears to be a stolen Toyota Land Cruiser.

The vehicle has been abandoned for years, rusting away in front of the sealed entrance. As of January 2024, the Kimitsu Civil Engineering Office has posted a removal notice on the vehicle, though its extraction seems nearly impossible, the car is non-functional, and the surrounding road is completely inaccessible to vehicles. A memorial stone dedicated to workers who lost their lives during the construction also stands on the Kimitsu side, offering a poignant reminder of the human cost behind the tunnel’s creation. The Mishima Tunnel remains a powerful relic of postwar rural engineering, an isolated, atmospheric ruin that preserves both the ambition and the hardships of the era in which it was built.

ORANGE MINE [IT]

Exploration #233 The orange mine. This small washery processed galena from a nearby mine, producing silver and lead. The area was known for its richness in iron ore since ancient times, in fact much of the slag found in the area leads one to believe that the Etruscans were already forging their weapons here. The minerals extracted from these areas were of such excellent quality that they were used to build parts of Italian nuclear power plants.

As a result of the depletion of the deposits and increasingly high extraction costs, mining activities slowly declined from the 1970s onwards.

If you enjoyed this article, you can also have a look at these other mines: Mina Petrila, Miniera rossa.

CHEREPISH MONASTERY [BG]

Exploration #179 Cherepish Monastery. We are in Bulgaria, near the banks of the river Iskăr, in a section where the river winds its way between inaccessible rocks in a gorge. It is a cold spring day and the landscape is made magical by an unexpected overnight snowfall. In this picturesque place, the Cherepish Monastery was built in the 14th century and is still a place of worship today. A few metres away are several other religious buildings, now abandoned.

It all began in 1902, when the Sofia Theological School was founded, an institute that became very prestigious over the years. During the Second World War, the School’s buildings were damaged by aerial bombs, forcing the students to be evacuated to various places in the country, including Cherepish, where until 1947 some classes were temporarily transferred to buildings constructed next to the railway. At the end of the war classes returned to the seminary building in Sofia, but in September 1950 the new communist government decided to use the building for the Ministry of Education and exiled the Theological School to the old buildings in Cherepish Monastery. There the life of the seminarians lasted until 1990, when after the fall of the communist regime, the Theological Academy regained its property in Sofia. Since that year the Cherepish Monastery buildings have been abandoned. A guard was initially posted to watch over the place, but over the years everything has been left to decay.

What we are about to visit is the church built by the seminarians removed from Sofia, dedicated to St. Clement of Ohrid (Св. Климент Охридски). The interior of the church was adorned with many frescoes, while the exterior was enriched by a narthex, decorated with columns, from which the bell tower rises. Since liturgical singing was also studied in the Seminary, a large balcony called ‘emporium’ was reserved for the choristers. The garden around the temple was also very well cared for. In the centre of the garden, a stone spring can still be seen, from which water gushed out to quench the thirst of visitors.

Unfortunately, humidity and water infiltration are slowly destroying the frescoes, and uneven ground is creating dangerous cracks by tilting the main walls. Visiting the abandoned church evokes mixed feelings. On the one hand, the quiet and peaceful silence accompanied only by birdsong. On the other hand, the empty church and the probing glances of the many forgotten saints show that everything is perishable, even the buildings that were meant to serve God.

HUNTERS HOTEL [DE]

Exploration #139. Legal visit. The Hunters Hotel is a disused hotel set on a hill, deep and remote in the German forest. It worked from the fifties until the mid nineties of the last century. The hotel was then abandoned but a gentleman is trying to take care of the structure. The hotel is a real time capsule: nice pastel colors are still decorating the bedrooms, whereas a stunning dining hall features carved wood panels and features, with many stuffed animals mounted on the walls.

EX CAVA DI ALPETTO [IT]

Exploration #114. These buildings housed the machinery for grinding the rock from the adjacent quarry. The raw material was then sent by ropeway to the cement factory.

The site had a very ancient history: quarries already existed in this area at the beginning of the 20th century, but it is from the 1930s that a large cement factory was born and began to exploit these rocks. A significant amount of cement used to build modern Milan came from that very plant. The quarry was exploited until the beginning of the 2000s after which, due to both the exhaustion of the material and the cement crisis, it was closed.

The factory, which still exists today but no longer produces cement, is located a few kilometres downstream and was connected to the quarry by a cable car. This facility was at the time the longest cableway for industrial use in Italy and, after it had become a characteristic element of the landscape and an attempt was made to save it as industrial heritage, it was unfortunately dismantled.
These we see were the material crushing buildings and the departure station of the cableway. To date, many projects for the recovery of the area have been presented whereas other projects for the maintenance of the vegetation, for the conservation, renewal and qualification of the environment were started from the same property over the years. However, this place can no longer go back to the way it was before human intervention but has now become part of the landscape with its unique beauty.

MINIERA ROSSA [IT]

Exploration #111. In the past this area was home to many mines, almost all of them for the extraction of iron. This mine, on the other hand, exploited important silver veins, already from the XV century. The activity flourishes for many years but towards the end of 1800 due to the scarcity of the material and to the lack of investments in machinery and extraction techniques there was a progressive decrease in production until its closure in 1904.

The rebirth began in 1935, when a new company interested in fluorite extraction took possession of the mine. The structures and machinery underwent a major modernization and already in 1939 about three thousand tons of fluorite were produced per year, the largest production in Italy. The demand for material was very high, many orders came directly from the Government of the United States of America and the mine ensured work and economic security for all the inhabitants of the surrounding area.

Unfortunately, the period of glory was not so long and already in the 1970s, as demand decreased, several changes of ownership began, and some workers were laid off. The excavation activity continued for some time, between interruptions and resumption, until the definitive closure in 1999. Since then the mine has been abandoned. Inside the mine there are still all the machinery for processing raw ore, while the external structure of plate and cement is now part of the landscape of the valley.