CRCMH
Wonder how many people here will know of the Canadian Red Cross Memorial Hospital? It has an entire website dedicated to it for anyone who wishes to find out more, but it is/was basically an abandoned hospital in Twyford, Berkshire. To get to it, you had to go through Burnham Beeches woods, which for anyone from the local area, or avid fans of David Icke, knows has been linked to Satanic cults, etc. So the woods are a little spooky to begin with. Then you pull up outside the gates for CRCMH. With the looming outline of the hospital in the darkness. There was also the circulating rumour of 'The Creeper' inside there - a demon apparently sighted by a group of teens who'd been there a few years previous. I remembered reading it on their website at around 12-13yrs old, and it really creeped the pants off me. Then to actually find out this place was right on my doorstep!

Sadly the only time I ended up there was when helping friends with a media studies film - they wanted a skinny young looking dark haired girl to stand in the middle of the woods a la 'The Ring' in a white lace frock, and asked me to be her. Burnham Beeches was chosen, in the middle of fucking winter. Cue me being left, shoeless, wearing only this daft lacey frock, in the middle of Burnham Beeches woods whilst they drove off with the camera, driving by to get the shot several minutes later... over and over again. Those woods are creepy as hell at night. Silent besides the wind and the animal noises. And dark. Really, really dark. After they got the shots they wanted, to couple with the spookiness of the woods, we went off to CRCMH.

Never did get to go inside. It's looming presence, along with the stories from people who'd come back from there, were enough to make the boys start to squeal. As I squealed I wanted to go in! yes, in my little lacey frock. I had at least put my shoes back on at this point though! Apparently the inside of the hospital was just left, completely abandoned - equipment, records, beds and all. THAT is what creeps me out more than any horror story coming out of there. The fact that abandoned places become just a snapshot in time, like everyone just left and that was it. I don't know why, but I find it so, so creepy to just leave everything behind in a post-apocalyptic fashion. There's always the thought of what the hell made everyone just up and leave like that? Why did nobody come back for the equipment, the patient records? I know the logical explaination is probably simply 'Funding'. But it still creeps me out.

Sadly, CRCMH has since been knocked down for flats so I shall never get the chance to go inside.
( Bathory, Sat 9 Apr 2011, 15:47, Reply)