This article is from WeChat official account: Bund TheBund (ID: the-Bund) , Author: Chang circle, the original title: “From Shanghai to Toronto, this group of people photographed the ruins with a sense of magical reality”, head picture source: Pan Ran
In a big city, there are too many ways to check in for travel.
Go to the Wukang Building to take a photo, or have an afternoon tea in an Internet celebrity shop, and you can also be a socialite for a minute.
But there is a group of people who avoid the city’s attractions and historical sites. They are keen to explore abandoned, dangerous, and unattended buildings and corners in the city.
Open the Xiaohongshu, and you can find more than 10,000 notes on the keyword “ruins”.
The American Dreamland in Jiading, Shanghai, gradually turned red after being abandoned in 2001. The novel American architectural style and supernatural legends have attracted many people to explore.
There is also a super-unfinished building in Shijiazhuang that was once called the “Venice of the Orient” and has been searched hotly-Xiangyun International.
The typical European architectural style and layered buildings are like walking into a steel-reinforced forest, giving people a sense of absurdity and bizarre.
When most people in China focus on taking pictures in abandoned amusement parks and unfinished buildings, ruin exploration has already had a more mature system in Europe and America.
They are called urban exploration(Urban Exploration), which is an expedition with artificial ruins as the destination.
In addition to exploring the ruins on the ground, urban exploration also includes underground explorations such as sewers and air-raid shelters, as well as stair-climbing parties.High altitude adventure.
The Urbex circle even set up an organization with its own website and publication. Most of the participants are young men, but there are also girls.
Beijing girl Pan Ran is an experienced player of urban adventure. In the past 5 years, she has traveled through the ruins of North America and wrote the first book about ruin exploration in China.
We talked to her about the magic of the local expedition ruins, which will attract these young people to go there.
Sewers, train cemeteries, she has been to more urban ruins
In the Urbex circle, the ruin address is called “dot”. Generally speaking, in order to protect the ruins, the location will not be made public.
There are various ways to find ruins. Some are good at online Google searches, and some like to exchange locations with friends.
Pan Ran lives in Toronto, Canada, and usually works in drug research and development.
She was attracted when she encountered the abandoned water park for the first time. “The warmth and the rundown reflect each other, and there is a strange beauty.”
Since then, Pan Ran has searched for addresses of ruins on the Internet, often driving or hiking seven or eight hours ago to explore.
Using her break time, in 5 years, she traveled to the “rust belt” of the Great Lakes in the United States.
Traditional industries here prospered for a while, and various ruins were left after the decline, including abandoned hospitals, churches, underground air-raid shelters and drainage pipes. Many of them are exquisite buildings.
Abandoned church
Abandoned Millionaire Mansion in Toronto, Canada
For Pan Ran, taking pictures is just a way to record the ruins. She pays more attention to the experience of the expedition.
“For example, in New York, what you see is no longer Fifth Avenue and the Statue of Liberty, but the stories experienced by some living characters.”
Pan Ran once drove through Interstate 75 in a large rural area in the central United States. From Michigan all the way south, he saw an extremely rare train graveyard.
Train Cemetery Winter
When Pan Ran and his companions traversed the wilderness of Virginia, they also encountered 43 huge statues of American presidents.
They stand on the wasteland like ghosts, letting the wind blow and rain.
Most of the statues are already mottled. Pan Ran said: “If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, it would be hard to believe that such a sight would exist in a country that even uses popcorn movies to promote patriotic education.” .
“Too many surprises and dangers encountered”
As an urban adventurer, Pan Ran has been asked the most and most curious question, is there any danger in exploring the ruins?
In the United States, abandoned buildings are legally prohibited from entering. Dangers are inevitable, such as being caught by patrol police, being robbed by homeless people, or being cut by nails in abandoned buildings.
Impressively, once she climbed into the backstage of a theater, it was very dark when she was walking forward, and she was scared into a cold sweat when she turned on the flashlight.
“There is a big hole half a step ahead, leading directly to the basement. If you go a half step further, I will fall straight down.”
Abandoned school auditorium
Abandoned school grand piano
Velvet seats in abandoned houses
Exploring underground systems such as sewers and subways is also dangerous. The underground world is intricate and complex. Unidentified chemicals, high-voltage electricity, high-speed trains, etc., all bring unsafe factors.
Different from abandoned buildings on the ground, there is no satellite map underground and it is extremely easy to get lost.
So no matter how many kilometers, tens of kilometers, injured or lost, those who choose to explore can only keep moving forward.
Although the urban adventure is full of uncertainty, for explorers, it can be a kind of life, a kind of fun, and it can lead people to open up one unknown world after another.
Pan Ran once carried nearly 40 kilograms of things on his back and walked 78 kilometers back and forth, crossing Russia’s military restricted zone, and saw the abandoned former Soviet Union’s snowstorm space shuttle.
The blizzard that represents the Soviet Union’s pursuit of the dream of the stars and the sea, the moment I saw it, made people moved and shocked, “The tears came down at the time.”
Kazakhstan abandoned the former Soviet Union Blizzard Space Shuttle
Through the ruin exploration, Pan Ran can not only come into contact with the novel world, but can even perceive the inevitable detours humans take in the process of urbanization.
There are a lot of abandoned theaters in New York State. When movie theaters appeared, many theaters were remodeled. When it was difficult to maintain, the theaters were abandoned.
“Compared with so many remaining amusement parks and unfinished buildings in China, more urban planners may need to consider more during construction.”
Abandoned Opera House
Abandoned Theater
In Pan Ran’s eyes, the ruins are not completely separated from the city, it is more like our entrance to another world.
In this world, we can see the history of the past and also know what is happening in the city.
things to pay attention to in urban adventure
Urban adventure is still a relatively small emerging hobby in China. But after getting into it, you will find that it is not only cool, but also can see the time passing in the city.
If you are willing to try, experienced player Pan Ran also gave some suggestions:
1. In daily preparations, you must wear hiking boots to go to the ruins. (protection of the foot: sprained, nailed through the sole); long Sleeve trousers; wear cut-resistant gloves. In addition, a flashlight, a bottle of drinking water, and a 3M mask. (Insulation leakage is very common, asbestos is harmful to the lungs).
2. Need a good physique, if you want to carryBring a camera, lens, and food, you will have a certain load. A good physique can ensure a smoother expedition.
3. If you are exploring abroad, you need to pay extra attention: Except for China, most countries have legislation on “entering the ruins”. Please pay attention to choosing the parking location (to prevent being beaten and looted, and to prevent parking directly opposite the ruins from attracting the attention of the security or police).
4. The most important thing in the process of expedition is to protect yourself, and then try to protect the ruins, so that people in the future can have more opportunities to explore.
As Pan Ran said, “the urban explorers only take photos and leave only footprints.”
Part of the pictures are from @然潘 for pictures, and part of the information is from “American Ruins”, thanks to Pan Ran for his help in the article
This article is from WeChat official account: Bund TheBund (ID: the-Bund) , author: Chang Loop