Urban Exploration (also known as Urbex) is the hobby (some might say sport) of exploring derelict buildings, underground bunkers, disused hospitals, asylums, schools, subterranean tunnels, abandoned factories and other such forgotten structures or pieces of land.
My husband is into Urbex and has visited a few different places including an abandoned lunatic asylum called Cane Hill and a hospital called Hellingly. Ever since he told me about the places he has explored I’ve been intrigued and have been looking at pictures of other peoples Urbex visits on the internet as I find them extremely interesting.

It is a common belief by most people that those who are into Urban Exploration will break into buildings to gain entry and is it assumed that any resulting damage inside the buildings such as graffiti, mindless vandalism and even arson is caused by them. However this, in the majority of cases is not so, serious Urbex enthusiasts abide by certain rules such as no breaking and entering, no vandalism or graffiti and no stealing. A well know phrase adopted by lovers of the hobby is “Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints”.

Most mindless damage to these buildings is actually caused by drug addicts bored teenagers, yobs and trouble makers who use empty premises as a meeting place. Those into Urbex usually have just one aim, to quietly look around the inside of abandoned and derelict places to see the architecture inside and the amount of decay caused by disuse, occasionally taking photographs to document their visit.

On Sunday my husband told me we were going on a secret photography afternoon. I had no idea where we were going when we headed off in the car and once we got close my husband told me that we were going to look round an abandoned nursing home a moderately short distance away from our house. My first reaction was a mixture of fear and excitement, having only ever read other peoples reports I had no experience of my own to go on – I was entering the unknown in more ways than one.

The building we would be exploring was built in around 1934 and was originally used as convalescence home housing inured war veterans and patients from the local hospital recovering from operations – there was also an adjoining mental hospital wing. The building itself is apparently listed however permission has been granted for redevelopment in early 2013.

The first problem of the day was actually finding the place; my husband had done his research and had armed himself with some directions. We programmed in the sat nav but when it said we had arrived at our destination there was no sign of the place, Google maps kept taking us past it too. After a few drives backwards and forwards we saw a possible access point and parked up. The actual building was nestled in amongst a forest so we made our way through the trees and soon we saw the grand building and were assessing the area. Hiding in the bushes we stayed well clear until we knew there were no security guards patrolling the site then seizing our chance we legged it towards the building.

We were in, we’d got the hard part out of the way, now the exploring could begin, my heart was beating ten to the dozen, a mixture of excitement, fear and anticipation sweeping over my body. Once inside we were met with a variety of rooms with a corridor separating them down the middle. The place was a mess, stud walls smashed to pieces in places, every window was smashed, there was peeling paint, graffiti tags sprayed all over the place, certain rooms had a large amount of fire damage inside obviously by junkies or arsonists since the building closed in 2006.

It was obvious that this place had been easily accessible for quite a while due to the amount of damage. After our trip I did a bit of research on this building and found a few other reports from people who had done previous Urbex visits to the site it was amazing to see how rapidly the building had gone downhill since the last documented visit I could find which was just 8 months ago.

We explored the ground floor, treading carefully as we went because of the amount of rubble and debris over the floors. By time we got to the middle of the building my heart rate had more or less returned to normal, I was starting to get into it and was really enjoying looking round. In the middle of the building was a large staircase starting on the ground floor at what I think may possibly have been the reception area and leading up to two further floors. My husband went into a room while I was taking some shots of the staircase…..



When I looked round I spotted what looked like a figure in the distance. Unsure of my surroundings I couldn’t quite work out if it was actually my reflection in a mirror or if there was actually a person there. I stopped and looked for a possible hiding place but I was right in the open with no place to hide away. My heart jumped into my throat at this point after all I had no idea who this person was and here I am in a rather eerie deserted building. I whispered to my husband that someone was coming and he quickly appeared from behind a half demolished piece of plasterboard which at some point would’ve been a wall. It turned out that there were in fact two people, walking towards us from the other end of the building.

The two figures reached us and it turned out they were two teenagers, I don’t think they were Urbex enthusiasts as one them a girl aged around 16 /17 said she was local to the area and that the place had become a bit of a hang out for the local teenagers (culprits for the damage quite possibly) after a brief chat we said goodbye and went on our way and we didn’t see them again. I must admit for a couple of seconds I was rather scared when I realised there were other people in the building – aaah well at least it made the visit a little more exciting!

We continued to explore and found a door with a hole kicked in the middle of it. My husband havingbeing more experienced took the lead and climbed through the hole, we came to a room with a few pieces of old furniture which had Christmas decorations strewn all over the floor – obviously used to give the residents some seasonal cheer. There were a variety of old records scattered across the room, some still in their original sleeves and some vinyl’s smashed on the concrete floor – classics like Elvis Presley unplayed for years with footprints all over them.

Through another door at the end of this room and we stumbled across another room which looked as if it was once the kitchen area, maybe the old gas cooker and tiled walls gave its identity away.

It was at this point we found this amazing piece of graffiti which luckily had evaded the spray cans of the taggers across the tiled wall. Now I know that graffiti is a nuisance and costs millions of pounds to clean up each year but personally I have to admit that as much as I hate stupid tagging which has no point or skill to it I do love seeing graffiti like this. To me these kinds of pictures created with spray cans are amazing pieces of artwork using a different kind of canvas and I love looking at them, I had to take a picture of it as it would’ve been rude to the artist not to have done.

So after taking in the kitchen we carried on as there was still so much to see. There wasn’t a piece of glass in tact and the whole building was completely wrecked inside, there were doors hanging off and faded curtains half hanging, ravaged by the tests of time and the elements streaming in through the gaping crevices where once window panes had been. We walked up the stairs to the top floor; the staircase was quite well preserved apart from the lack of front to the building which had mainly been all glass windows previously. When we got to the top floor the right hand side of the building had obviously been torched and suffered a huge amount of fire damage.

However the corridor to the left had remained untorched (for now). The picture above and the picture below are actually the same corridor but separated by the landing at the top of the stairs, the fire damaged one above leading off to the right and the non fire damaged one below leading off to the left – you can see the difference in the two.

I love the picture above; I think it looks so eerie with the curtain blowing in the breeze which ran throughout the building. I certainly don’t know how people explore these buildings at night it was spooky enough during the day!

By this point I must admit I was starting to think we were pushing our luck, we had been inside the property for well over an hour and so we decided to head back to the car. Looking back now I wish we had looked round a bit more as there was still plenty left to see but I think my nerves were starting to get the better of me a little – after all this was my first time exploring in a totally derelict building.

It was a really enjoyable experience and I am definitely glad we did it, I found it really interesting if not a little nerve wracking at time and a little scary but I would definitely like to go and look round another derelict building in the future it’s just a case of finding a place to go now.
As always thanks for reading and lease leave a comment if you have enjoyed it.

Big Cats - Last Page

Now for the final part of my visit to the WHF.

This is a little overdue; I have been so busy that this is the first opportunity I’ve had to write it up so firstly apologies for that but hopefully it will be worth the wait.

The rest of the day was free time for us to walk around the centre and go back to the animals we wanted to get some more pictures of – except the leopards as they are so quick and unpredictable you can only visit them with a keeper. I had a walk around and revisited some of the cats that I had already seen to try and get some additional pictures of them starting with the Pallas cats then working towards the tigers. This is when my favourite part of the day took place.
When walking towards the main tiger pen there was a solitary tiger in an enclosure and he was laid down right next to the fence and when I say right next to the fence I mean literally against it. Realising this was the perfect opportunity as there was no other visitors anywhere near me I very quietly sat down next to the fence right next to where the tiger was sitting and said hello to him. I couldn’t quite believe that I was sat about 6 inches away from a tiger chatting away to him telling him how absolutely beautiful he was!

The next thing I knew just as my own cat at home would do he rolled upside down onto his back and pulled in his paws in towards the centre of his body and let out a little noise, not quite a purr but quite similar to one. So I slowly got out my camera and took a couple of shots……

After a couple of minutes he rolled back over and lay against the fence so I took the opportunity to get a close up picture of his eye……if you look closely you can see my refelection in it.

He repeated this about four or five times, rolling onto his back and posing for me some more before rolling back and relaxing again. He kept making these little noises exactly how my cat does when she is ‘talking’ to me but obviously a lot louder than my pet does! It was such an amazing experience – I mean how many people can say they had a ‘chat’ with a Tiger?

The very last animals I met on my visit to the WHF were the Kings of the Jungle – the Lions. They have three lions at the centre Tiny, Kafara and Manzi who are all brothers who were born at Woburn Safari Park, the brothers had to be moved to as the from Woburn as they already had resident male lions in their pride.

Now admittedly on the day of our visit the lions didn’t really do much except spend most of the day asleep in the sun! Occasionally they would get up for a short while to turn over or have a yawn with their huge mouths but most of the day they seemed like they hardly moved.



The African lion is the only big cat not endangered, being listed as a “threatened species”. This means there are some restrictions in international trade of lions and their parts. Lions are found through out sub Saharan Africa inhabiting savannahs, grassy plains and open woodlands. Their life span is on average 15 years in the wild with captive lions living up to their late twenties.

Lions are the only social member of the cat family living in groups known as prides consisting of related females and their young and 1 – 2 males. It is the females who do most of the hunting, running at a maximum speed of 30 mph over 50 yards. They are 1 of 4 of the big cats that can roar. It is said that a lions roar can be heard over 5 miles away. The biggest threats to the lion population in the wild are poaching and hunting of the animals and through disease such as canine distemper and FIV which is the feline version of HIV.

Another group of people came to the enclosure who were being shown round by a keeper; they weren’t a photography group as they didn’t have cameras. They may possibly been a group of people who were attending one of the afternoons for animal adopters to visit their chosen adopted cat. The keeper explained that lions like the smell of lavender; she then got some lavender oil out of her pocket and applied some to the back of her hand. More or less immediately one of the lions (I think it was Tiny) jumped down off his wooden platform and came over to the fence. He started rubbing himself up against the fence the same way a household cat rubs itself up against the furniture – he loved obviously really did love the smell of the lavender oil. The keeper then let us stroke the lion through the bars which was fantastic! The fur on his body looked as if it would be very smooth but it was actually very wiry and his mane was really wiry and dry not at all how I expected it to be, not that I ever really expected to ever get to physically stroke a lion!

Before I knew it the day was over and it was time for me to start the drive back to Milton Keynes, I must admit I didn’t want the day to end it had been amazing from start to finish. It wasn’t just about the photography for me but I actually ended up enjoying seeing the cats close up and hearing about the work the Wildlife Heritage Foundation are doing at trying to save these spectacular big cats from possible extinction.

I am definitely going to be returning to the centre again, they run photography days throughout the year and I know that the Talk Photography Forum are planning on running some more days next year so hopefully I will be able to make one of those. I would definitely recommend the photography days for anyone who would like the opportunity to get up close to these animals for themselves – the money raised also helps the centre pay for the upkeep of the cats that reside with them so it goes to a worthwhile cause.

I’m also considering adopting one of the cats through the adopt an animal scheme run by the WHF. For £50 a year you can adopt a cat of your choice and you get invited to visit the centre on adopter’s day so you can see the progress your animal is making.

For more information about the Wildlife Heritage Foundation please look at their website http://www.whf.org.uk

So that brings my big cat’s diary to a close but before I go I want to share with you my favourite picture from the day……

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Big Cats Day - Part 2

In today’s blog I will be continuing with my visit to the Wildlife Heritage Foundation and the Big Cats photography day I attended there last weekend.

The next cat we met was Malawai who is a Serval. These smaller cats live mostly in South Africa, they have bold markings, long legs and tall oval ears. Avid hunters they use their ears to detect rodents even those which are burying underground, their long legs allow them to see over the top of tall grasses.

When hunting Servals will sometimes pause for up to 15 minutes with their eyes closed, they can jump almost 10 feet off the ground and can quite often be found catching passing birds. We were told by the keeper that Malawai kills anything which gets into his enclosure from mice and rats to low flying or birds resting in the shrubbery – basically if you are a small animal which gets in this guys pen your lucky to get out alive!

The biggest threat for Servals in the wild are humans who hunt them for their coats which are then sold as young leopard or cheetah coats, however they can survive well in the presence of humans and are sometimes tolerated and encouraged to live near farms as they help keep the rodent population under control.

We then had a break for lunch so a chance to take the pictures I had already taken off my memory card just in case anything happened to them and also to give me some more space for the afternoons antics as I knew we still had plenty more cats to see.

The first cats we saw in the afternoon were the Cheetahs, Pepo and Mephisto two males who live in separate enclosures. Pepo is the older of the two at 9 years old and was a successful member of the breeding programme having fathered 10 offspring he is now retired and will remain at the WHF.

Mephisto is four years old and was born at Safari de Peaugres in France he came to the WHF in January 2008 after an attempt at getting him to be a partner to a Cheetah at Paradise Wildlife Park failed, possibly as he is still quite young. He was bought to the centre to try and mature and learn something about Cheetah life from Pepo. Mephisto is nervous of everything on the site including the ducks on a pond next to his enclosure.

Pepo’s favourite pastimes include relaxing in the sun and chasing the trains which pass the site of the adjacent railway line – he did this a few times while we were there and it showed just how quickly these cats can run.

Cheetahs aren’t as endangered as some of the other cats at the centre but still work is being done to get the captive animals breeding so that some of them can hopefully be released back into the wild. Now it’s off to see the newest additions to the WHF the pumas.

Valentina and Viktoria are two sisters that came to the centre in September 2008, they are settling in really well to their specially adapted enclosure. Pumas are also known as Cougars or Mountain Lions, they can differ in colour and size and can be found in a variety of habitats from mountain forests to swamps and grasslands. Valentina is the more shy of the two Pumas at the WHF choosing to stay out of the way for most of our visit and hiding behind some of the cubby holes that have been created for the cats to sit under in their enclosure.

Pumas usually hunt alone and will stockpile their food if large enough in dense undergrowth, returning back to it over several days. They are a similar size to a Leopard and can easily catch prey as large as a cow or a horse due to their powerful and muscular bodies. In the wild when hunting the Puma uses it powerful hind legs to lunge at its prey and can jump in excess of 40 feet. Viktoria was especially good at demonstrating this by jumping for us a number of times in her enclosure to catch her food.

Numbers of Pumas living in the wild are most at risk from hunting and trapping by humans which is unfortunately the case with a lot of these big cats. This is one of the things that saddens me about the human race is that it seems intent on destroying everything beautiful about our planet.

After meeting Viktoria and Valentina we were taken to meet Petra the resident Lynx. A medium sized cat who is very powerful she starred in a children’s TV programme called “Brilliant Creatures”

Petra is a very intelligent cat and is always ready to play games with her keepers, she is able to jump 4 metres in the air to grab a piece of meat from the end of a pole. In the wild Lynxes would live in a wide ranging area from the Southern European Coast to the Artic Circle, their big feet and long legs mean they are adapted to travel through deep snow.

In some areas the Lynx is a protected species however in other areas they are hunted for the legal fur trade. The Lynx is also sometimes killed by farmers as if food is scarce they will take farm animals to feed on. In harsh winters the loss of animals for the Lynx to prey on can also cause a problem to the species. Petra doesn’t have to worry about this as she tucks into her tasty pigeon…..

Lastly on today’s blog are the Snow Leopards. By this time the sun had come out and was blazing away, it was absolutely sweltering and a lot of the cats were taking shade to keep cool and having a little afternoon siesta and the two Snow Leopards Ranschan and Mizi were no exception.

Mizi was having a snooze up on her treetop platform and even some fresh chunks of meat couldn’t tempt her down so while everyone else was concentrating on the keeper trying to get Mizi down to the ground I spotted Ranschan in his enclosure wide awake and headed off to get some shots of him. He was obviously quite sleepy but he did pull the cutest pose ever for me.

These leopards would usually be found in some of the world´s most remote habitats, ranging from China, Nepal, India, Kazakstan, Mongolia and the Gobi dessert. A protected species, numbers are estimated to be between 3,500 to some 7,000, due to the cats elusive secretive nature, their classed as endangered animals on the Worlds Conservation list.

It was so hard looking at some of these animals to believe that they had the inclination and the ability to kill but if I needed any kind of reminder it was from this moment when Ranschan decided to show me the size of his teeth!

I’m sure that his dentist bill isn’t cheap with those huge incisors!

Well I think that’s enough for today, I still have one more animal to tell you about and a lovely story from my day but I‘ll leave those till next time but I hope you have enjoyed todays post.

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