BT Tower - Lon

This has to be the cleanest explore I've ever done and one that's been on my list for a very long while.

In fact it was so clean that I showed up in a black suit, black shiny FBI shoes and was for all intents and purposes a bona fide business customer, in fact there's no way you would get in here without the correct 'credibility props' and it certainly makes a change from wading around in cold, deep, stagnant water, human faeces or crawling around in deep, musty bunkers, hell I even got coffee and a name badge :-)

Built between 1961 and 1964 and up until 1980 the tallest building in London weighing in at 189.0 metres (620.1 ft) makes it still a VERY neat place to visit. Another neat feature is the high speed lift which runs at 7 metres a second, getting you to the 34th Floor (Top of the Tower) in less than 30 seconds. To get that far you MUST have an invite, be on their security list, produce pukka Photo ID and go through airport type security, including walk through 'Gatescan' metal detectors, baggage X-Ray and Hand Held Weapons scanners......mind you none of these spotted my Polymer Koppo Stick, I've walked through airport security all over the world with this badboy, plus a few Crown Courts ;-p

Photography up there is a witch though as the outer section of the room is rotating relatively fast, sunlight is coming through from all angles and reflections from other panes of glass in the structure are damned hard to avoid (in fact I've binned 20 shots already)

Enjoy...

First glimpse from Tottenham Court Road

Centrepoint, London Eye

Rooftop Football...

Heron Tower, St Mary's Axe, The Shard

Lost and Found - Drakelow RGHQ 9.2

I guess its as easy to lose 93 photo's as it to lose one (and I'm still looking for my West Norwood Cemetery Catacombs shots from 3 years ago...one day they will show up on a backup drive I'd forgotten about...)

So, I stumbled across 93 pix I shot at Drakelow RGHQ 9.2 several years ago and thought I'd post up a very small selection here, mainly cos I thought I already had already blogged them.

They were all shot on the little Lumix T76 backup camera so are not that great but they still have an interest all the same.

Air Vent

BBC Studio

Splinter's Lair (Resi)

Been meaning to hit this place up for a little while, each time I've been there in the past there was much less water and some rather large rats mooching around inside.

In fact on my first visit one dark night I waved a P7 around and caught sight of a very large rat I dubbed Splinter. He stopped for a second and looked at me before carrying on about his business in a Devil May Care kind of way, he didn't care that I was watching him nor that I was hitting him with 200 lumens.

Yesterday was so boring after a day of Jet Washing the patio I decided to go back to Splinters Lair with a camera and fire off a few shots. It's not a big place, just three arches and with much of the original pipework still intact. Still trying to pin an exact date on it, at first (at night) I thought it was Victorian but now I doubt that.

Last night there was about a foot of water inside and no sign of Splinter or his mates, I'm sure he will be back when it dries out though :-)

2013 - Carpe diem...Carpe diem!!!

2012 kind of sucked regarding exploring and ultimately was a disappointment....lots of doors where 'shut' in our faces thanks to the narcissistic actions of others (you know who you are, I know who some of you are....and really you SHOULD know better), locations sealed, locations burned...blah blah blah.

The year ended with an epic though, that I can't talk about in public, so it wasn't all bad. So while we were out yesterday walking off some of the Xmas Fat we decided the whole Carpe diem thing should apply this year......work hard at making opportunities, hit things fast instead of sitting on them (so they get discovered by others and burned...), well that's the theory and it's easy to be so full of enthusiasm in January LOL!

A few pix of the twin bores we visited, there's another pair about 1.5 miles south that we also went to, (so ended up walking about 5 miles), nothing too exciting I know.

All shots handheld on the Lumix TZ6

Hiatus

Not dead, not given up exploring, although I am totally sick of all the 'Look At Me' narcissists out there who are falling over themselves to show off sites in order to get praise from their peers.

Is it possible to be an actual 'Insecure Willy Waver'....?

I've just been away doing stuff that I'm either not going to publish myself or I have been asked/ordered not to publish. I'm cool with both of those as I have nothing to prove to anybody and the fun is in the actual exploring, not showing off Trophy Pix.

Some lame crap I can post here (just to show some activity...) is some stills from a WW2 Operations Block shot back in October. We were there testing GoPro POV camera's before and after a firmware upgrade that seems to have screwed them up somewhat. I seem to have lost the video footage we shot someplace but when I locate the files I will add them to this post.

It's a shame about the state of this place, the local Chav morons seem to like trashing the place and holding raves in here from time to time, even knocking down a bricked up entrance to get their lame PA and Lighting Rig in here. Sadly the world will always be full of shitheads polluting the gene pool, its a fact of life.

Chesty Morgan

Now the title has grabbed your attention (but only if you are male and over 40) I will disappoint you by not showing you a pair of 73FF breasts but instead another piece of junk for my car boot.

I do expect to get a lot of use out of this particular toy though as it can be used in so many locations. In a nutshell its a small elasticated Chest Harness that lets you mount a GoPro HD Hero or GoPro HD Hero2 out of the way but in the perfect place for action shots and in a more discreet way than the 'stands out a mile' Head Strap Mount that I also use from time to time.

Stand by for some video content in the future :-)

Bury Internalz

Carrying on with the Mil Derp Cold War vibe from earlier posts.....enjoy

Bulk Fuel Storage (WW2)

Transmitter Building

Briefing Room (Badly lightpainted...)

Flora & Fauna :-)

Building 25 - Decontamination Area

More rush lightpainting (soz about passing headtorches...)

Better this time...(shot in total darkness)

Building 25 Hard Area

Parachute Store (Building 51)

Photographic Processing and Interpretation Facility (Building 69)