• Tagged abandoned, abandoned Varosha, Cyprus, Famagusta, ghost town

Imagine yourself on an island in the Mediterranean with beautiful white sand beaches, warm weather, fantastic places to shop, fine dining, and modern luxurious hotels that are frequented by the vacationing rich and famous. Then boom, the island is invaded and you must flee for your life from that slice of paradise. From tourist hotspot to ghost town, it’s a No Man’s Land with ruins that are rotting away. This happened: the island is Cyprus, the year was 1974, and the area was known as Varosha, a section of Famagusta. The crumbling vacation resort is a “forbidden zone” that has been stuck in time and slowly decaying for nearly 40 years. Sure, you could cross the “Buffer Zone” to see what that moment in time looked like when people fled and Varosha was abandoned, but if caught . . . trespassers will be shot on the spot. [36 Photos]

• Tagged A Good Day to Die Hard, abandoned amusement park, abandoned ghost town, adrenaline rush, Chernobyl, Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant., disaster, ghost town, nuclear power plant disaster, Pripyat, Red Forest, reverse ecotourism, Ukraine, urban exploration, urbex

The Chernobyl nuclear reactor disaster happened 27 years ago on April 26, 1986. After the explosion, a radius of 18.6 miles (30 km) was setup as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. That “zone of alienation” is becoming more frequently seen in popular culture; it was seen in the 2013 film A Good Day to Die Hard, in the 2012 Chernobyl Diaries and also in the 2011 movie Transformers: Dark of the Moon. The area is featured in hundreds of documentaries and even early on in the 1998 film Godzilla as a researcher studies the mutational effects of radiation on native earthworms. It’s the nightmare setting for several video games. Although urban explorers have been coming to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone for years, Ukrainian officials opened the zone for tourists with “special permission” in 2011. Whether you call it reverse eco-tourism, terror tourism, or an adrenaline rush urban exploration, it would undoubtedly be surreal to experience. Some claim it’s haunted, while others think it’s a dream setting for playing a zombie apocalypse-like paintball gun war. Thanks to those that were brave enough to take up their cameras and Geiger counters, we can take a virtual tour of the Exclusion Zone. It includes Prypiat, Prypiat amusement park, Polissya hotel, the Red Forest and more places stuck in time as everyone was evacuated with no time to pack. This is what visiting the Chernobyl disaster after almost 27 years looks like, since criteria for this photo essay included being creative commons photos taken as recently as possible with as many different radioactive areas as possible. Enjoy!
[69 Photos, 8 Videos]

• Tagged abandoned, archaeological, architecture, coastal fortress, coral reefs, diving, DRTO, Dry Tortugas, Dry Tortugas National Park, ecosystem, environment, Florida, fort, Fort Jefferson, Garden Key, ghost town, island, islands, Key West, lighthouse, Loggerhead Key, marine life, National Park, nature, sea, shipwreck, shipwreck diving, snorkel, sunken treasure, treasure hunting, wreck diving

About 70 miles west of Key West, Florida, lies Dry Tortugas National Park which is world-renowned for picturesque blue sea waters, white sands, brightly colorful coral reefs, abundant marine life, and legends of shipwrecks and sunken treasures. There are seven small islands in the 100-square mile park, but it is mostly open water that is accessible only by boat or seaplane. Dry Tortugas is also famous as the home of magnificent and historic Fort Jefferson, the largest masonry building in the Western Hemisphere. Though it was not finished, the fort has more than 16 million bricks that make up the massive 45-foot-high, three-level hexagon, coastal fortress that has 2,000 architecturally beautiful arches. [44 Fabulous Photos]

• Tagged abandoned, abandoned ghost town, abandoned railway station, abandoned resort, Abkhazia, architecture, bizarre, Black Sea, Caucasus Mountains, forest, Gagra, Georgia, ghost town, ghosts, haunted, mountains, resort, Russian Riviera, Russian ruins, seaside, war, waterfall, woods

Once upon a time, in a subtropical climate on Georgia’s Black Sea coast, there were glorious scenic wonders like beautiful beaches, lush wooded mountains, and buildings of grandeur at a resort paradise known as the Russian Riviera. But a bloody war erupted in Gagra and countless thousands were murdered, an extermination of the Georgian people. Gagra became a war-torn paradise resort in ruins. Now this “Russian Riviera” is an abandoned ghost town. [46 Photos]

• Tagged abandoned, Africa, architecture, desert, diamonds, environment, ghost town, ghosts, haunted, images, Kolmanskop, nature, photos, pics, pictures, sand

There is a slowly sinking city in the desert of southern Namibia, Africa, a ghost town called Kolmanskop. In the 1900s, diamonds were discovered just sitting upon the sand, waiting to be found, so people from all over the world with diamond fever flocked from the port of Lüderitz to the once desolated lonely desert. Kolmanskop became a mining town, but after the First World War when diamonds sales dropped, the sand-clearing squad failed to show up. That was the beginning of the end; Kolmanskop turned into a ghost town being buried by sand and trapped in time. The TV show Destination Truth visited this ghost town since it is highly rumored to be haunted. They were not disappointed, having captured EVPs of ghosts whispering, seeing shadows, hearing footsteps, and having the fluff scared of out them in Kolmanskop. [21 pictures]

• Tagged abandoned, arrested decay, Bodie, Bodie State Historic Park, California, ghost town, historic, photos, pics, pictures, State Park, Wild West

Bodie State Historic Park is a California gold-mining ghost town with over 170 buildings which are protected in a “state of arrested decay.” That means officials won’t fix up the abandoned buildings, but they won’t let Bodie fall to dust either. Bodie was too wicked to ever truly die. More than 1,000 remote acres make up the once violent, lawless and booming gold mine town in the Wild West. Nearly 200,000 yearly visitors come to roam the ghost town of Bodie. We love these pics! [13 Photos]