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Hello again explorers,
With the recent warm weather just ahead of the official start of spring, we headed out to revisit a nearby favourite abandonment of ours around the corner. This old farmhouse has not been occupied for some time but the property is still productive, being used by one or more adjacent farm owners.
Not much had changed. Nature is still working on reducing the structure to rubble and leveling it to grade.
During the summer time, the flooded basement is a favourite haunt of every disease-carrying mosquito, but as the temperature still dips below zero at night and does not really thaw out the frozen block of water in the basement, it is a wondrous suspended animation that we had not really been able to capture appropriately with our cameras.
Personally, I am always amazed when I find muted colours on kitchen cabinetry, wallpaper, and furniture.
I guess I assume that after so much time untouched by human maintenance, all the colours would simply bleed out leaving what I imagine would be a dog's eye interpretation of the colour spectrum.
Anywhoos - we're looking forward to the warmer season to get in a decent amount of time of urban exploration. Look to several more posts over the course of this summer - until next time, Happy & Safe Exploring.
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With several missions on the planning board, our first stop was at Funky Punky's old place of residence. The images her mother had provided clearly showed a property which was shown care in order to provide a home for the young family.
Our exploration however, showed a farmhouse in an advanced state of decomp and a property which had become a dumping ground for area a$$-hats wanting to get rid of old cars, tires, garbage, and construction waste. Both I and David Suzuki frown . . .
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Our explorers today . . .
Funky Punky (left) and JFK (right)
And your's truly, CopySix, a man forever driven to photograph a sweet abandonment.
The interior had some 'spongy' floors in some spots and quite a few pieces of furniture which appeared to be ravaged by denizen critters.
This child's teddy-bear appears to be slowly incorporated into the surrounding debris and detritus on the floor here.
There was a very small kitchen located just off the living room. Personally, I've seen larger kitchens in RV's. In other news, I wish my g/f was as dirty as this sink. Some old styl'n curtains just outside the kitchen made my teeth hurt when I looked at it. I remember as a kid having nasty-a$$ curtains like this in the home I grew up in it was tacky as hell back then BUT, if one were to clean it up and match it with appropriate decor, you certainly would be kicking it retro-licous.
Anywhoos, as it is not everyday that one sees a suitcase in a fishtank I thought this may make an interesting shot. Loads of personal effects still in the house and it is all slowly being returned to a zero-energy natural state.
Although, most of you know my UrbEx kink is institutional, insdustrial and commercial (in that order), I do not mind at all exploring a residential or rural abandonment from time to time, especially when said location has a personal connection with a member in the exploration party.
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"Trinity" . . . Yep - - Please expect a set of three posts here as well another excellent video from yours truly. This is Post #1 of 3 of a recent rural exploration I took in with our most excellent UrbEx buddy neX who acted as local guide in this neck of the woods near Aurora.
This old farmhouse had a very lovely addition to it on the east side (not shown here). Surrounding by residential and commercial development on all sides, this location gave a flavour as to what a working farm looked like here less than a decade ago.
It had appeared that the last time an interior decorator popped around to this place may have been in the late '70's / early '80's. You may call this hideous and want to beat the former owners with a style stick, but I call the shizzle 'retro-licious' !
There is a theme most avian to these two images. One is of a bookshelf in the west living room retro-fitted to house an aviary. The other is a robin, quite dead in the basement . . . or perhaps just asleep / dreaming and pining for the fiords.
Here in the image on the left, my narcissistic side is showing itself in my photographic work. I am also somewhat 'hooked' on this image on the right taken from the front hall . . . (get it - - 'hooked' ! - that was a funny there).
The stairs and arrangement of rooms upstairs were very typical to just about every other farmhouse I had been in dating from this era. The only bit of interest to be had up here was the interior electrical wiring exposed by the removed floor-board (image on right). Unfortunately that image did not really turn out.
I have noted with a casual interest that in many abandonments, I have explored, the previous owners often leave behind toilet plungers and brushes. Although I am rather certain that there is a good reason for this, the answer is presently just beyond my grasp. Also, it was noted that this house was operating with an older version of Windows from which I am sure they had a beautiful rural vista.
This particular barn did not hold much interest for me, that being said in comparison to the wonderful barn neX toured through which will be revealed in our third Aurora Rural-Ex Trinity post.
~Stay tuned kiddies, more to come.
Until next time, Happy + Safe Exploring.
aka - The 'Crime-Scene' House
The Township of Oro-Medonte is located just a titch north and east of Barrie and has previously offered up a number of decent abandonments worthy of exploration. This lovely abandoned farmhouse provided decent photographic opportunities and a good number of personal effects left behind by the last denizens.
Those who have had the pleasure of exploring with us know we deeply respect each property we visit and the privacy of the owners. Shown here is our very own JuicyFruitKisses knocking of the (boarded-up) door to ask permission to photograph . . . no owner could be found.
We checked the washroom (read: outhouse), out back and still could not find anyone. Personally, I rather like outhouses . . . you might say I have a 'leaning' for these comfortable commodes.
Speaking of commodes, I am starting to feel that this post is developing a theme . . . perhaps even its own movement. According to a recent survey, this model 245 PortaPottie beat the competition checks down. A poke with a prudently long stick produced a sloshing sound . . . we're hoping its rain-water.
Moving along - we discovered the remnants of a vintage television in the field behind the house. I could not find the remote control so had to 'manually' switch channels using a "dial". I kept getting the same program where this crazy red-head is jeering at me.
As we continued our reconnoiter out back, we also discover that the previous occupant may have been a fancier of outdoor motorised winter sports. We suspect this hobby had a short life . . . from 1969 to 1971.
We found covers for a 1969 Moto-Ski as well as a 1971 Ski-Doo Nordic, shown below with the garish product brochures from the day.
We probed the remnants of the barn which also contained a limited number of items (including another toilet). Observing that the structural integrity was questionable, we left . . . we were sort of 'tired' of this anyway.
On the way back up to the house, I ate a bit more on my memory card with these two shots. I realised two things as I took these . . . (1) no farmhouse is complete without a rusty wheel-barrow parked in the middle of a field and . . (2) I was taking a lot of black and white images.
It is now the part of the post where I explain the alternative title - Oro 'Crime Scene House'. JFK spotted this in the middle of the overgrown track just behind the house.
That's right, several yards of OPP crime scene tape and a 12-gauge casing. If any readers or members of the local constabulary know what may have gone down here on the 7th Line, please let us know.
Near the back door was this relic from another time . . . a time when smiling uniformed milk delivery staff would provide dairy goodness in these metal cases. Don't get too reminiscent, this was also a time of manual channel changing.
Evidence found inside the house from periodicals and fashion faux-pas indicate that the domicile was last inhabited in 1995. We also learned that the previous owners enjoyed vodka and Dobel (a product of a Mexican mistake between tequila and kahlua).
This house was constructed in a day where electric base-board heaters was just a wet-dream of your local utility. We see here the stove flue piping its way up through the upstairs bedroom and then outside.
Attached to the bedroom upstairs was this room featuring a funky tile design and this lovely old-skool hi-fi stereo console. Unfortunately it appeared that a raccoon used the console to dump in . . . repeatedly.
Not much had changed. Nature is still working on reducing the structure to rubble and leveling it to grade.
Personally, I am always amazed when I find muted colours on kitchen cabinetry, wallpaper, and furniture.
