From the Land of Sky Blue Waters
A half hour until the end of yet another miserable shit of a work day, my phone vibrates in my pocket. Hunter's voice sings out the muffled cry of " Sloppy Joes! Sloppy Joes!" and I shut off the ringer and fish the phone out of my pocket to see who texted and why. "Going to hamms wednesday night. Let me know if you're interested." ("Hamms" being an abandoned brewery in NotMetropolis.) It's weird and wonderful how sometimes a simple text at the right time can make everything better.
The main problem with the local explorers is they're all vampires, as near as I can figure. Which is all well and good on a weekend, but not as cool when I'm expected to be in the office at 6am the following day. Nevertheless, Wednesday night at 9 o'clock found me in a park overshadowed by the night's Adventure! with Slim Jim, waiting on another friend of his. It was never stated, of course, but I get the impression that this is more feeling out and evaluation on Jim's part. A cautious fellow he is. He's been inside the place a half dozen times or more, knew all the ins and outs, he was here to see what The New Guy and I would come up with inside.
We made our way to the building and spread out, each of us poking around for an opening. We were instructed to be careful because, apparently, the place is watched pretty closely by the police. It seemed reasonable, so we were careful about our approach and investigations. In short order I found an inadequately boarded window that the others had passed by and we were in. The first order of business was getting our shit together and ready to go. And of course, this includes beer. I only brought a few and drank each quickly, once opened, so they wouldn't be in the way. Jim was taking a much more casual approach to the evening, because of his familiarity with the place and the fact that he was taking a backseat to the exploration itself. He walked around all night with a beer in his hand as though he were at a party. Climbing through windows and weird holes, crawling through pipes and tunnels, only once in the entire night did he have to hand off his bottle to get through a particularly small opening. It was kind of hilarious.
For the first part of the evening, Jim tasked us with discovering where the old brewery caves were. Interested, I sniffed the air and, only then, recognized the old familiar smell of sandstone caves. "Smells like they're right over there," I said. Jim and the other guy (who probably has a name of his own, but I'm not sure) exchanged a glance and one of them said, "Well, I guess someone's done this before." I smiled to myself as I turned the corner and, sure enough, steps going down to brick and sandstone. I think Jim was a little deflated, but the night was young and I'd already scored twice, so I was feeling pretty good about it all.
The caves went on a weird twisting path, supported in most places with massive, ornate brick arches. The place had no clear rhyme or reason to it, seemingly having been tunneled by mental patients. I have to assume it followed existing openings in the sandstone and these were enlarged and supported to fit the needs of the brewery. I would have liked to get a few shots of some of the arches, but mostly the place was close without being cramped and there wasn't any particular feature that seemed to require documentation. We scuttled through holes tunneled through bricked up sections and explored everything we could before making our way back upstairs.
Discussing old explorations with people is difficult. While we were underground, discussion turned to the caves in Lillidale. MPuzzle and I have been in and out of them, but that was 20 years ago and the memories are hazy. Not only that, but we weren't part of any community. These places all have names and when the locals discuss them, they can say, "We were in Horseshoe one day and blah blah blah," while I smile and nod and try and piece together enough details of the discussion with my own memories to figure out what they're talking about and what I remember. "You've been in the Lillidale caves, right? Which ones have you been to?"
"Fuck if I know. We never knew names, we just found holes and climbed into 'em." That's pretty much my answer whenever anyone asks me about our youthful explorations, actually. We found holes and came back with shitty flashlights to see where they went.
Back on the ground floor, the next room was dominated by a gigantic fuel oil tank and various mechanical apparatus. I bounced up a stairwell, intending only to check out a door, but Jim pointed out that the stairs kept turning around the room. When he said it led up to the Grand Hall, everything else was forgotten and I made my way up and around. Coming to the top of the staircase, I was confronted with what, I'm sure, would have been a gorgeous old room, open three or four stories up featuring a grand staircase in the middle. Probably would have been fucking amazing... if it wasn't ten o'clock at night and we had to keep our flashlight use to an absolute minimum to keep the lights from being seen from outside.
Don't get me wrong, it was still impressive, but it could have been so much more. This night-time crap confounds me. Underground it makes no difference, but this kind of felt like a waste of a great photo op.
From there, we made our way around the place, ever upwards, seeking the roof. We found it and, while it wasn't as grand as some of the roofs MPuzzle and I have seen (fucking Pillsbury!) it was nice just to be there, enjoying the night and a few beers. I set up my camera and took a few shots, but nothing spectacular, and then put it away to enjoy the night.
Looking down from where we were standing and talking, I saw a curious phenomenon right across the street. Very casually, I gestured and asked, "Hey, is that a whole parking lot full of squad cars right down there?"
"Oh, yeah," Jim stumbled, "I probably should have mentioned that there's a police station right across the street. We should maybe back up a little bit from the edge." Note to Self: Jim will occasionally not mention potentially crucial details of our environment.
We chatted in the night air for a while until we decided to move on. We passed through many rooms featuring gigantic tanks that once held beer (if you could call it that). We went through all manner of storage and processing rooms. We passed through a completely non-terrifying skyway into another building and poked around in there. We made our way into a basement that extended across several buildings, most of which were pretty well sealed. And kind of creepy, to be honest.
By this time it was nearly one in the morning and while I wasn't exactly tired, I knew that I would be hurting the next day. The other guys are both out of work at the moment, so I sort of cut their night short by being all employed, but when we stumbled across a section of the brewery that Jim hadn't even known about yet there was no way for me to call off on that. Crawling through weird internal spaces between buildings that were joined at some point in their life, we found a "new" section of the plant. Climbing out a narrow window onto a wooden shelf of unknown purpose (and structural integrity) which allowed access to a thousand-year-old aluminum ladder, we investigated some sort of garage and maintenance area. From there into some sort of offices.
It seemed like the night was finally wrapping up and we were looking for a different way out than we came in, my heart did a weird little dance when I discovered an open manhole in the floor with a ladder going down into it. It was exciting, because it was new. It was dreadful, because it was getting really fucking late.
So I kind of neglected to mention it and we climbed out a window and began our exfiltration.
Outside of the building, we were to make our way into the park and then across that to where our cars were parked. Looking over the lay of the land, I saw a set of tail lights gleaming on the street where our cars were parked. "That's curious," I thought, so I looked a little closer. And then I noticed there was another car pulled up right next to that car, facing the other direction such that the drivers could chat easily without leaving their cars. Cops are pretty much the only people you see parked like that, with only a few scattered exceptions, and these cars did appear to have lights on top.
We got off the grounds without incident and into the park. Jim and the dude with a name were about to head over to the cars, still not seeing the cops waiting there. "Guys. There's two cop cars right there."
"Oh! Shit... I guess we'll go this way, then."
They were discussing means of approaching in super-ninja style when I interjected. "Look, if we just go around this way, we come in off the street and there's nothing wrong with that. We were at a party."
"Oh, yeah. Should we go the long way around, though?"
"I don't want to walk that far. Seriously, it's two blocks the short way, let's just go." This involved a lot more discussion than maybe it should have, but eventually we were ready to disembark. During our delay, the cops apparently got tired of whatever they were doing and they left, so we cut directly through the park, said our goodbyes, and parted company.
I didn't get to bed until 2am. I set the alarm for 6:30 and prayed for mercy.
It was a good night.
The main problem with the local explorers is they're all vampires, as near as I can figure. Which is all well and good on a weekend, but not as cool when I'm expected to be in the office at 6am the following day. Nevertheless, Wednesday night at 9 o'clock found me in a park overshadowed by the night's Adventure! with Slim Jim, waiting on another friend of his. It was never stated, of course, but I get the impression that this is more feeling out and evaluation on Jim's part. A cautious fellow he is. He's been inside the place a half dozen times or more, knew all the ins and outs, he was here to see what The New Guy and I would come up with inside.
We made our way to the building and spread out, each of us poking around for an opening. We were instructed to be careful because, apparently, the place is watched pretty closely by the police. It seemed reasonable, so we were careful about our approach and investigations. In short order I found an inadequately boarded window that the others had passed by and we were in. The first order of business was getting our shit together and ready to go. And of course, this includes beer. I only brought a few and drank each quickly, once opened, so they wouldn't be in the way. Jim was taking a much more casual approach to the evening, because of his familiarity with the place and the fact that he was taking a backseat to the exploration itself. He walked around all night with a beer in his hand as though he were at a party. Climbing through windows and weird holes, crawling through pipes and tunnels, only once in the entire night did he have to hand off his bottle to get through a particularly small opening. It was kind of hilarious.
For the first part of the evening, Jim tasked us with discovering where the old brewery caves were. Interested, I sniffed the air and, only then, recognized the old familiar smell of sandstone caves. "Smells like they're right over there," I said. Jim and the other guy (who probably has a name of his own, but I'm not sure) exchanged a glance and one of them said, "Well, I guess someone's done this before." I smiled to myself as I turned the corner and, sure enough, steps going down to brick and sandstone. I think Jim was a little deflated, but the night was young and I'd already scored twice, so I was feeling pretty good about it all.
The caves went on a weird twisting path, supported in most places with massive, ornate brick arches. The place had no clear rhyme or reason to it, seemingly having been tunneled by mental patients. I have to assume it followed existing openings in the sandstone and these were enlarged and supported to fit the needs of the brewery. I would have liked to get a few shots of some of the arches, but mostly the place was close without being cramped and there wasn't any particular feature that seemed to require documentation. We scuttled through holes tunneled through bricked up sections and explored everything we could before making our way back upstairs.
Discussing old explorations with people is difficult. While we were underground, discussion turned to the caves in Lillidale. MPuzzle and I have been in and out of them, but that was 20 years ago and the memories are hazy. Not only that, but we weren't part of any community. These places all have names and when the locals discuss them, they can say, "We were in Horseshoe one day and blah blah blah," while I smile and nod and try and piece together enough details of the discussion with my own memories to figure out what they're talking about and what I remember. "You've been in the Lillidale caves, right? Which ones have you been to?"
"Fuck if I know. We never knew names, we just found holes and climbed into 'em." That's pretty much my answer whenever anyone asks me about our youthful explorations, actually. We found holes and came back with shitty flashlights to see where they went.
Back on the ground floor, the next room was dominated by a gigantic fuel oil tank and various mechanical apparatus. I bounced up a stairwell, intending only to check out a door, but Jim pointed out that the stairs kept turning around the room. When he said it led up to the Grand Hall, everything else was forgotten and I made my way up and around. Coming to the top of the staircase, I was confronted with what, I'm sure, would have been a gorgeous old room, open three or four stories up featuring a grand staircase in the middle. Probably would have been fucking amazing... if it wasn't ten o'clock at night and we had to keep our flashlight use to an absolute minimum to keep the lights from being seen from outside.
Don't get me wrong, it was still impressive, but it could have been so much more. This night-time crap confounds me. Underground it makes no difference, but this kind of felt like a waste of a great photo op.
From there, we made our way around the place, ever upwards, seeking the roof. We found it and, while it wasn't as grand as some of the roofs MPuzzle and I have seen (fucking Pillsbury!) it was nice just to be there, enjoying the night and a few beers. I set up my camera and took a few shots, but nothing spectacular, and then put it away to enjoy the night.
Looking down from where we were standing and talking, I saw a curious phenomenon right across the street. Very casually, I gestured and asked, "Hey, is that a whole parking lot full of squad cars right down there?"
"Oh, yeah," Jim stumbled, "I probably should have mentioned that there's a police station right across the street. We should maybe back up a little bit from the edge." Note to Self: Jim will occasionally not mention potentially crucial details of our environment.
We chatted in the night air for a while until we decided to move on. We passed through many rooms featuring gigantic tanks that once held beer (if you could call it that). We went through all manner of storage and processing rooms. We passed through a completely non-terrifying skyway into another building and poked around in there. We made our way into a basement that extended across several buildings, most of which were pretty well sealed. And kind of creepy, to be honest.
By this time it was nearly one in the morning and while I wasn't exactly tired, I knew that I would be hurting the next day. The other guys are both out of work at the moment, so I sort of cut their night short by being all employed, but when we stumbled across a section of the brewery that Jim hadn't even known about yet there was no way for me to call off on that. Crawling through weird internal spaces between buildings that were joined at some point in their life, we found a "new" section of the plant. Climbing out a narrow window onto a wooden shelf of unknown purpose (and structural integrity) which allowed access to a thousand-year-old aluminum ladder, we investigated some sort of garage and maintenance area. From there into some sort of offices.
It seemed like the night was finally wrapping up and we were looking for a different way out than we came in, my heart did a weird little dance when I discovered an open manhole in the floor with a ladder going down into it. It was exciting, because it was new. It was dreadful, because it was getting really fucking late.
So I kind of neglected to mention it and we climbed out a window and began our exfiltration.
Outside of the building, we were to make our way into the park and then across that to where our cars were parked. Looking over the lay of the land, I saw a set of tail lights gleaming on the street where our cars were parked. "That's curious," I thought, so I looked a little closer. And then I noticed there was another car pulled up right next to that car, facing the other direction such that the drivers could chat easily without leaving their cars. Cops are pretty much the only people you see parked like that, with only a few scattered exceptions, and these cars did appear to have lights on top.
We got off the grounds without incident and into the park. Jim and the dude with a name were about to head over to the cars, still not seeing the cops waiting there. "Guys. There's two cop cars right there."
"Oh! Shit... I guess we'll go this way, then."
They were discussing means of approaching in super-ninja style when I interjected. "Look, if we just go around this way, we come in off the street and there's nothing wrong with that. We were at a party."
"Oh, yeah. Should we go the long way around, though?"
"I don't want to walk that far. Seriously, it's two blocks the short way, let's just go." This involved a lot more discussion than maybe it should have, but eventually we were ready to disembark. During our delay, the cops apparently got tired of whatever they were doing and they left, so we cut directly through the park, said our goodbyes, and parted company.
I didn't get to bed until 2am. I set the alarm for 6:30 and prayed for mercy.
It was a good night.