The Houses are Dying

Lee-Ann sent me this link, 100 Abandoned Houses. It is heartbreaking to look at them but I looked at all 100, cringing and sighing over some of those beautiful homes being left to fire and eventual death. A house can die I think. It may not be alive in the sense of having blood or opposable thumbs, but it is a creature of sorts. When (if) you look at these houses think of them as a home, a place that used to have a friendly kitchen and bedrooms where children lined their stuffed animals up along the headboard of their bed. These houses aren’t homes but they have lost more than that. One, in particular, just seems to be moaning “I’m hurt.” Where did the people go? I read the about page for the site, that explained some of it.

Maybe knowing Detroit is/ was a big part of the auto industry explains even more. Will this be the future for more of our cities as the big employers buckle under and there are fewer jobs for an increasing population? Could the cities become ghost towns, like out of some science fiction story? It’s a weird feeling to look at these houses and know they are all in a large city, not some out of the way farmhouse in rural Ontario.

Weekend Hobbyists Tell All!

I have a fair weather hobby, rural exploration. I take photos of abandoned farm houses here in Ontario. I moderate (somewhat) a group on Flickr, called Ontario Rural Ruins, if you would like a look at the photos from myself and others. Many people look for spookiness and creepy ghostly hauntedness in the houses. People take the photos and add elements to them to bring out a feeling of spookiness even. I don’t see them that way at all. I never go to a house expecting to see anything haunted, though I do believe in ghosts.

The houses appeal to me a on different level. I find them lonely, romantic, mysterious and stoic standing there in all the elements, alone and neglected year after decade. I think it’s something about their stoic disposition that gets to me. Even when the windows are gone and look more like hollow eyes the house still stands. The remnants of old woodwork speak for the past life and love which once were there. The more weathered and seasoned the house appears the more I enjoy walking all around it, looking for spots to photograph. Some photos are of small bits of things but most I take include the whole house, the weeds growing up around it and the lay of the land around it. A house on a hill is especially proud looking, even as it falls apart.

What is your weekend hobby and how would you talk aobut it to others who want to know what you like about it?

Gorgeous but Abandoned

Originally uploaded by phrenzee

I hope to make this my first Spring rural exploration road trip. Hard to see something with all that work on mouldings and such just left to fall to ruin. I really want to spend time and see it all, to the last detail of that detailed work.

From what I heard someone does own the property (of course) and they may be unsettled by explorers. I will see if I can talk to someone and get permission. I’ve always had good luck doing that, so far. Would be a real shame if I didn’t get to see this one. I’m still sorry I missed getting to see inside of the gorgeous artsy looking house with the weathervane.

Wide View

Wide View
Originally uploaded by Pistol Dave

I’m really looking forward to the end of the snow so I can go out and find places like this one. I envy those who can drive around in winter and get snowy photos. This is a great one. I really like the way the house rests on the top of the snowy hill with the blue sky towering over it. Shows the power of the elements, or at least the weather.

Grrl Explorers on Flickr

Female Urban Explorers –

Urban Explorers tend to be men…which is no bad thing for us girl explorers 😉 but being such a rare breed, it’s always nice to meet other girls interested in UE. This group is a place for UE girls to get together to talk about our explores and experiences and a place to share our images. Let’s celebrate the fact that we are female Urban Explorers….and proud of it!

FUSE – Female Urban and Street Exploration

…interesting artifacts found on the street that have been abandoned or unused for quite sometime, parts of a building that has lots of character, or urban exploration in general (the inside of an abandoned building, house, etc).

Why females only? The art of UrbEx is male dominated. I wanted it to be known that women are out there UrbEx’ing too.

Do it for the grrls!

Old House Quote from Calpurnius

Sometimes you read something on another blog that you could have written yourself. It’s a good thing that the world has so many different people in it who can think or feel the same way.

“I have a nasty habit of traveling roads left to themselves. As I came around a curve, I saw this house on its hill. Empty. Abandoned. The windows as dark as soulless eyes. I stood there in the overgrown driveway for what seemed like a lifetime as I debated going further. Something compelled me to move; something compelled me to stay. In that I found myself trapped like the house.”

From Calpurnius.com

I read this a couple of days ago but have been traveling a lot this week and have not had time to catch up here. This week I have been as far north as Sturgeon Falls and North Bay and as far south as the heart of downtown Toronto. (Drove through the Exhibition grounds and under the CN Tower).