Many of us feel the attraction of visiting forgotten or haunted places, intrigued by the chill that it sends down our spine as we try to grasp the intricacies of their stories. These places survive as skeletons of the role they played, hollow of the life they once held, but still alive with the weight of their history and perhaps the shadows of the lives that once unravelled in these places.
Halloween on Female First
That same urge to revisit and come closer to past events that are still very vivid in the consciousness of many lies behind the production of the new Sky series Chernobyl, to delve deeper into the story of the now deserted city of Pripyat, Ukraine. The series has recently been nominated for 19 Emmys, gaining recognition by America’s most famous TV Awards. Following the success of the recent drama Chernobyl, and also the buzz around for the controversial Netflix series Dark Tourism, HolidayPirates has dug out more spooky places across Europe that attract tourists from all over the world with a taste for the unusual.
Pripyat, Ukraine
The town of Pripyat was built in 1970 along with the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and became a ghost town after the nuclear reactor failed on 26 April 1986. This place for many has become the symbol of contemporary desolation. In just four hours, Pripyat's entire population was evacuated, and with radiation remaining too high for human inhabitance, citizens never returned. Among the overwhelming sense of abandonment, the most iconic reminder of the disaster is a rusting Ferris wheel in an amusement park that was due to open just days after the accident took place. The visit is definitely not a light stroll, as well as being a sombre moment of acknowledgement of the tragedy of the city’s fate, it also serves as a chilling reminder of the destructive power of our own inventions. HolidayPirates is offering travel packages to visit the sites and gain a deeper understanding of the events that surrounded this now desolate place.
Teufelsberg, Berlin
Berlin largely known for its parties, art scene and overall lively night-life has also a number of secluded locations that can be visited, where reminders of its history reside, sometimes almost forgotten. One of these places is Teufelsberg, an old listening US station in the western outskirts of the city in the Grunewald Forest. The construction and the giant receivers were built on a man-made hill with the rubble of a Nazi military college after World War II. During the Cold War, the station was used to listen for signals coming from the Soviet side. Since 2011 Teufelsberg can be visited daily and offers the perfect viewpoint to capture breathtaking sunsets over the hills.
The Cappuccini Catacombs of Palermo, Italy
The Cappuccini Catacombs of Palermo are burial catacombs under a monastery in the Sicilian city of Palermo. Today they provide a somewhat macabre tourist attraction as well as an extraordinary historical record. Bodies started to be buried in the catacombs when the cemetery exceeded its capacity in the 16th century. It is definitely not something for the faint-hearted, more than 8000 mummies of mostly clergy and nobles, some over 500 years old, are resting there still wearing their finest clothes. The best-preserved body is the one of Rosalia Lombardo a two-year-old girl who died of pneumonia in 1920. Out of infinite love her father arranged for her body to be preserved with the most advanced techniques available at the time. Now the girl appears immersed in the deep and peaceful sleep of eternity.
Buzludzha Monument, Bulgaria
Ready for an alien experience? The Buzludzha Monument, also called the House of the Bulgarian Communist Party, built in 1981 in Bulgaria, offers a truly out of the box spectacle. With the fall of the Communist Party in 1989, the building was abandoned. Since then it has become an all-time favourite of Red Tourists and Urban Explorers alike. Buzludzha is listed among the creepiest abandoned monuments on earth. Each year it attracts hundreds of photographers and adventure seekers. The memorial is near one of the main highways from Sofia to the beaches of Burgas, so if you’re heading to Bulgaria’s beaches and Sofia on the same trip, don’t forget to check out this unusual site. The easiest way to visit the abandoned monument is to book a tour, however, its illegal to enter the building.
The Hoia Forest, Romania
The Hoia-Baciu Forest, regarded the World’s Most Haunted Forest, can be found near the city of Cluj-Napoca, Romania in the heart of Transylvania. It covers an area of over 250 hectares and is often referred to as the ‘Bermuda Triangle’ of the country. It is said that a shepherd, after who the forest is named, disappeared after entering, along with his 200 sheep. Myths revolving around the forest say that the place is haunted by their restless ghosts meandering lost through the trees. The forest is also famous for its paranormal activity with faces allegedly appearing in photos and were not invisible to the naked eye, as well as UFO sightings. The vegetation is also abnormal with strangely shaped trees and an unexplained circular clearing which has defied many scientists that have tried to find a scientific reason for its lack of plant growth.