SHIOBARA GRAND HOTEL [JP]

Exploration #288 Shiobara Grand Takinoyu Hotel. Shiobara Grand Takinoyu Hotel is a former hot-spring hotel in Shiobara, Japan. Once part of the town’s long spa tradition, the large complex later closed and remained standing as one of the area’s most visible abandoned hotels.

Shiobara has developed around its hot springs for centuries, and the hotel belonged to the modern phase of that tourism economy. Its scale is deceptive from the street: photographs show a much larger complex extending behind the main façade, with several levels built into the slope. Little reliable information survives about its opening date or final years. A 2017 photographic record already described the building as disused and noted that it appeared to have been abandoned for some time. Period accommodation listings indicate that the hotel once operated as a substantial resort, with rooms overlooking the Shiobara area and rates of around ¥15,000 per night.

I found the hotel completely by chance while walking through the town. Its size and silent windows immediately stood out among the active buildings around it. What began as an ordinary walk became an unexpected exploration of a place that still reflects the rise and decline of Japan’s large hot-spring hotels.

LIMA TRENINI [IT]

Exploration #94. These empty buildings hosted a famous factory of train modelling.

MANOIR AUX STATUES [BE]

Exploration #59. Manoir aux statues. This villa is located along a big river at the edge of a forest. It is quite isolated and well hidden by vegetation. It has this name because it contained in the past some statues which have since disappeared as a lot of other valuable things.

The villa was built in the early 1800s but it was not originally a manor house. At first, it was a flour mill. Later, the mill will be used to produce oil. Finally it was changed to a residence. The last owner left everything behind to move to South America and never returned. Considered a historic site to be protected, the Town Hall had tried to barricade the house after the owner’s disappearance but nowadays the house is collapsing and full of objects of all kinds.

GEAMANA FLOODED VILLAGE [RO]

Exploration #40. Geamana is a very unique ghost town located in Romania. Its peculiarity is being entirely submerged by of a toxic red lake created by men. The tragedy of this village, that once occupied a fertile and sunny valley, began in 1977. In that year the dictator Nicolae Ceausescu decided to begin the exploitation of the nearby copper deposit of Rosia Poieni, in those years the largest in Europe .

At first the residents of Geamana imagined getting some small profits from the nearby copper mine but unfortunately it was not. The copper extraction process in fact produces large quantities of toxic waste, in particular sludges containing cyanide and other metals that must be adequately treated by expensive machinery. The brilliant idea of the former dictator was therefore to store these muds, and what if not the nearby valley of Geamana could serve for this purpose? In 1980 all the lands were expropriated, a large containment dam was built at the beginning of the valley and toxic mud began to take the place of the green cultivated fields. About 400 families were promised new fertile lands but in reality they were moved to cities more than 100km far and received only a small amount of money. About 20 of the 1000 inhabitants of the valley of the past, mostly elderly, have instead decided not to move but to build new houses at an ever higher point.

As the exploitation of the mine has continued over the years, so the level of this surreal toxic lake increased. To date practically the whole village has been submerged, except for the bell tower of the old church, once the high point, and the new homes of those who decided to stay in this forgotten and forever poisoned place. The old cemetery, which the authorities had promised the former occupants of the village to move, also now lies submerged near the church. It is now only a matter of little time that the bell tower is forever submerged, putting the end to the history of Geamana.

RED STAR TRAIN GRAVEYARD [HU]

Exploration #34 Red star train graveyard. The red star train graveyard place was once one of the most important railway repair workshops in Hungary. For the residents of Budapest this place goes by the name of Istvántelek and for the rest of the world, that name is Red Star Train Graveyard, the place where trains went to die.

The Istvántelek Train Yard, aka red star train graveyard, was built in Budapest between 1902 and 1905, going on to serve as a sprawling, modern repair facility for the city’s trains. In fact, one of the workshop halls was so large at 24,000 square meters that it was noted as Budapest’s largest building in 1902.

In this train graveyard it is possible to find some MAV class 301 locomotive that was the star of transportation from 1911 to 1914 and the huge and powerful MAV class 424 locomotive another engineering marvel that Hungary produced weighting an impressive 137 tons. The current collection of rusting gems includes also German freight cars that very well could have transported Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz during Nazi occupation.
More than 100 locomotives and railcars are here and around it in the fields rusting. The colossal locomotives were brought to this place to be repaired and transported to the Budapest Railway Museum but the museum does not have money for their restoration.

VILLA SBERTOLI [IT]

Exploration #2. Villa Tanzi-Lugaro, or Villa Sbertoli, is part of a big abandoned asylum complex in Italy, which comprises about 25 buildings. Originally an aristocratic abode, in 1868 the villa was bought and was converted for use as an asylum by Professor Agostino Sbertoli. The first patient of the clinic was just a Professor’s son, who suffered from mental disease. The number of patients grew in a short, forcing Professor Sbertoli to acquire others villas and to erect new buildings.

The asylum increased his reputation and before long many important doctors operated in the complex. Many wealthy Italian as well European families send their insane since the asylum guaranteed an high level of privacy.
For these reasons the buildings of the complex were well-finished: luxury single apartments, a billiard room, an aviary, a church were part of the complex. Many animals lived freely in the very elegant gardens. The asylum passed down to a Professor son and after to private citizen. In 1950 the complex was acquired by the province and in 1978 it was closed following law Basaglia. Most of the buildings are now falling into a state of disrepair and some of them are completely bricked up. Villa Tanzi-Lugaro was one of the most elegant building of the complex: its ornately plastered ceilings and beautifully painted art on the walls remain a testament to the buildings grand history.