last weekend i was at the inota festival in an abandoned power plant and managed to check out the nearby soviet ghost town of szentkirályszabadja. nice combo.
Szentkirályszabadja – Soviet Ghost Town
built in the 1960’s, szentkirályszabadja was built as a fully functioning town and military base housing up to 6000 people at one time.
it’s been heavily scavenged, but the buildings are still in decent shape considering it was abandoned at some point in the 1980’s just before the collapse of the ussr.
the abandoned theatre was one of the more interesting buildings…
filled with tires for some random reason.
it contained a theatre, schools, pubs, restaurants and was able to support the military base and their families. now it just feels like a zombie film set.
it was quite relaxing to walk through and takes up a huge area. it was almost empty except for a goth couple posing for selfies in the old theatre and a random guy dirt-biking in circles. to be honest it sounded initially like a chainsaw so we were happy to not get hacked into pieces.
it’s being slowly covered by nature and makes for some amazing exploring if you don’t mind a few thorns and giant mosquitoes.
it is sometimes referred to as “hungary’s chernobyl”, however they do not have a lot in common. chernobyl felt as though all the residents vanished at once, while this site slowly became unoccupied over a few years, so there are almost no personal items left behind.
one site had piles of old film which was cool, but in general almost anything that could be moved has already been taken.
a few buildings are collapsed, but most are still in decent shape considering how long they’ve been abandoned.
it is definitely urbex light, but it was an interesting and unique walk through history.
this place is on a massive scale. it would take a day to explore everything. i unfortunately ran out of time as the sun was setting, but it was still an amazing place to spend a few hours.
