Wallpaper peeling from the walls, mouldy ceilings and furniture left frozen in time – these popular airports and destinations for holidaymakers were once filled with buzzing conversations and laughter. While some places have been redeveloped or demolished, others have turned into eerie time capsules for urban explorers, photographers and ghost hunters alike. Here we’ve selected the most astonishing images of abandoned spots past and present.

Overlooking the stunning Tequendama Falls, this hotel opened in 1929. For decades it welcomed thousands of wealthy tourists, who came to see the spectacular waterfall.

But as the Bogotá river got increasingly contaminated with sewage and other liquid waste, the tourist numbers slowly dwindled. The hotel closed in the early 1990s but a museum exhibition about biodiversity was recently set up in the abandoned space.

Even celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay couldn’t work enough magic to save this hotel and restaurant after it was featured on his Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares TV programme in 2005. Just two years later in 2007, the once-popular family-owned spot in England’s Midlands shut its doors for good and the site lay abandoned for years. 

Over the course of a decade the 20-room, 70-seat restaurant with function rooms was left to fall into disrepair. Photographed here in 2017 the décor remained much as it was when the last guests checked out, with bedrooms still packed with fixtures and fittings and clothes slowly gathering dust.

There’s hope for the building now though as new owners have purchased the site. However, with some significant structural issues, including one of the floors collapsing, it’s likely the whole building will be torn down and redeveloped. 

This ship-like Art Deco building first opened its doors as a hotel in 1932, but due to its proximity to the Spanish border it was closed during the Spanish Civil War and the Second World War. Unable to regain its former glory it closed down for the final time in 1983.

Part of the building has been restored and converted into holiday flats, retaining the original features. Other areas of the hotel have been restored and are used for private events. It’s open to visitors most afternoons and can be freely explored inside.

A kosher establishment, catering primarily to wealthy Jewish clients from New York, Grossinger’s grew from a Victorian hotel in the early 1900s to the first ski resort in the world to use artificial snow in 1952.

The hotel closed in 1986 after Grossinger's descendants sold it and has lain empty ever since. Inside many features such as this bathroom and the indoor pool are still broadly intact.

Salton Sea in California used to be home to bustling resort towns in the 1950s, including Salton City and Bombay Beach. While its name might suggest a coastal spot, it's actually a lake located in the desert to the southeast of Palm Springs that formed in 1905 when the Colorado river breached a canal and filled a parched basin. 

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After a series of unfortunate events, which began with Hurricane Kathleen in 1976, killed the lake the resorts died a death too as tourists stopped coming and most residents cleared out. Now, only remnants of its empty diners, abandoned motels and boat ramps remain. However, the ravaged desert community has enjoyed an artistic renaissance recently.  

The Lee Plaza opened in 1928, facilitated by local developer Ralph T. Lee. However, both Lee and the hotel suffered during the Great Depression and he ended up bankrupt in 1935.

In the coming decades the hotel was turned into a senior citizens’ home until it was closed in 1997. Rumours that the site would be redeveloped into flats have circulated for years, but currently the historic high-rise remains untouched. 

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Originally opened in 1953, this resort became extremely popular after it appeared in the 1961 Elvis Presley film Blue Hawaii. It was closed in 1992 when Hurricane Iniki swept across the island. However, the luxury resort reopened in 2018 under Hyatt ownership.

One of the pioneers of Croatia’s tourism, Kupari holiday village was a military resort for the elite of the Yugoslav army from the 1960s. When the Croatian War of Independence broke out in 1991, the army fled, and the resort was heavily bombed.

It has been a popular attraction for urban explorers, but this won’t last for long – the old ruins look set to be replaced by a new 5-star resort.

One of the buildings in the resort known as Bokor Hill Station, the Bokor Palace was built as a mountain retreat for Europeans in the early 1920s, when Cambodia was under French rule.

It was first abandoned by the French in the 1940s and was then used as a stronghold by various political movements until the early 1990s. Modern infrastructure has made the mountainous region accessible again and there has been a stunning hotel on the site since 2017.

Located by the spectacular Puente del Inca rock formations and hot springs, this hotel was built in 1925. Every room in this luxury retreat had its own spa until the frequent landslides disabled the trans-Andean train service and it was abandoned in 1965. Now only a small part of the original building, pictured here, survives.

Built between 1936 and 1939, this beach resort spanned an astonishing 2.8 miles (4.5km) along a lagoon on the isle of Rügen in the Baltic. A particularly striking example of the Brutalist architecture during the Third Reich, the eight vast holiday buildings which became known as the Colossus of Prora, were actually never used for their intended purpose.

Since 1945, when the Soviet Army took over, the complex was subject to various uses. Somewhat controversially, the buildings have now been repurposed as a residential development and holiday resort, which includes the world's largest youth hostel. A section has also been bought by the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern to house a museum about the complex's dark past.

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Initially intended as a resort for the US military, this project was never finished due to financial troubles and the deaths of several construction workers in the 1980s.

The pod-like houses were a tourist attraction due to their unusual appearance. However, in 2010 they were demolished to make way for a new resort and water park.

Originally founded as a tavern in the Pocono Mountains, this resort was popular with honeymooning couples. It expanded to include 100 bedrooms, a ski resort and a golf course.

Sadly, it closed when its co-founder Frances Paolillo died in 2009 and the county took over the estate due to unpaid taxes. It was abandoned for many years during which time it was vandalised and ravaged by various fires. Due to safety concerns, demolition work began on the once-popular stop on Route 447 in 2021. 

North of Kobe in Japan, the Maya Hotel sits atop Mount Maya. Built in 1929, it was only accessible via a cable car and when that was suspended during the Second World War, the hotel closed too.

Since then, damaged by a typhoon and a strong earthquake, it has become a popular spot for urban explorers.

First established as a health retreat in the early 20th century, Gagra was intensely developed as the Soviet Riviera along the coast of the Black Sea during the 1920s. The resort town was immensely popular with holidaying Soviets, but also served as a rehabilitation site for soldiers wounded in the war.

In its heyday the town had its own railway station, theatre and beachside colonnade, and was filled with stunning holiday homes. However, it was abandoned in the late 1980s, when tensions grew between different communities in the region. The resort suffered heavy damage during the Abkhazian-Georgian war in 1992.

Notable for its unusual Moorish décor, this Italian palazzo in Tuscany was built in 1605. Redeveloped into a luxury hotel in the post-war era, the stunning building was abandoned in 1990 and has been neglected for more than 20 years.

However, its Moorish beauty remains, with colourful tiling and murals throughout. Now privately owned, it's off-limits to visitors although you can read more about the property here.

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Before the Turkish invasion in 1974, Varosha – situated in the southern quarter of Famagusta – was a thriving holiday destination filled with resorts and hotels. Thanks to its stunning sands, it once attracted celebrities such as Elizabeth Taylor and Brigitte Bardot. Take a look at these vintage photos of Hollywood stars' vacations. 

 

When the Turkish army invaded, its inhabitants and visitors fled, and the once-popular tourist destination has been uninhabited ever since.

Dubrovnik, Croatia’s most popular tourist destination, is a thriving city, attracting millions of visitors every year. However, just a few miles outside the UNESCO World Heritage Site, this 5-star luxury hotel has been abandoned since the Croatian War of Independence in the early 1990s.

Located just above the seashore, with views of Dubrovnik and the island of Lokrum, this sprawling resort has fallen victim to vandals. However, part of the hotel was used during the filming of season 4 of Game of Thrones. There are plans for the site's demolition and redevelopment. 

Another abandoned holiday resort in the Pocono Mountains, Buck Hill Falls was originally founded in 1901. Financial troubles and several fires led to the closure of the 400-bedroom resort in 1990.

In the early 2000s the crumbling resort was the victim of an arson attack. After much wrangling about what to do with the historic property it was demolished in 2017.

One of the first high-rise buildings in the city, the Divine Lorraine first served as a luxury apartment complex before it reopened as a hotel in 1900. In 1948 the hotel was bought by spiritual leader Reverend M. J. Divine (or Father Divine, as he was also known), who turned the hotel into the first fully racially integrated hotel in the USA. It closed in 1999 and was reduced to a hollow shell, with no windows, doors or floors remaining. The building has recently been renovated and now houses 101 luxury apartments.

Opened in 1989 to lure tourists to the then untrammelled Azores, Hotel Monte Palace only operated for just over a year before it was shut. Since then, the mountaintop resort has been abandoned and became a popular destination for urban explorers keen to photograph its crumbling shell, dilapidated rooms and stunning vistas of the Sete Cidades lake.

The ghostly five-storey building, which is located on São Miguel island, just above the village of Sete Cidades, was bought by real estate group Level Constellation in 2017 with plans to redevelop the site as a luxury hotel. 

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Built in the 1960s, Kozubnik was a communist party holiday resort complete with swimming pools, saunas, restaurants, bars and even a bowling alley. Located in the valley of Mała Puszcza (meaning Little Wood) in southern Poland, it is surrounded by hills and thick forests.

After communism fell in Poland, it was sold to a private company, who closed the hotel when it went bankrupt in 1996. Much photographed over the years, the complex has now been purchased and redeveloped.

Captured here by urban explorer and photographer Yannick Vandermolen, Villa Cannaert used to be a 4-star luxury hotel and restaurant. It was sold to private investors, who have since fled the country after being caught for tax evasion. “The place has been seized by the authorities and is now up for auction. While this beautiful place is waiting for a new owner, it makes the joy of urban explorers,” Yannick said in 2014.

This Belgian hotel was built in 1904 and could hold up to 80 guests in its once-luxurious rooms. When Yannick photographed the building, he met the owner too: “He told me that it closed because it went bankrupt, that no one volunteered to take over the hotel and that he wasn't able to afford the cost of maintenance. He seemed very sad about it. This hotel must have been a big part of his life.” Demolition began on the hotel in 2020.

Built in 1868, this spa resort (once known as a thermal institute) closed when a new spa resort opened up nearby. Interestingly, the hotel never had a name, so it was given one. “Urban explorer (urbex) community loves to give strange nicknames to the abandoned places, so the guy who found it called it Alla Italia, probably due to the beautiful painted ceilings and the columns that somehow reminded him of Italian architecture,” Yannick explained.

Another urban explorer and photographer Brian, who runs the website preciousdecay.com, captured this dilapidated scene at a former boarding house in Germany. Little is known about the property, but Brian has given it the name Mold Hotel – and it's clear why.

Untouched for 20 years, this ski resort in Saxony was frozen in time as soon as it was abandoned. During Brian’s visit, he captured not only the deteriorating inside but also discovered a room still filled with old ski equipment.

Also photographed by Brian, this castle in Germany – known as Villa Woodstock thanks to its glorious wooden interior – used to be a hotel and spa built in 1883. From 1990 it was used as a home for the elderly until it closed in 2012 and was left abandoned.

Very little information about this holiday resort is available as it has been abandoned for many years and its original name has been lost in time. Brian, who captured this shot, says there are actually several abandoned buildings covering a large area.

Opened in 1900, this hotel had its own pastry shop, a Viennese restaurant and numerous tennis courts. Since then, the hotel has undergone several renovations and was finally demolished in 2017. In this picture, Brian captured the lost soul of the hotel bar by illuminating it with coloured glow sticks.

The hollow shell of the once-thrumming Royal Hotel is all that remains of Linda, a ghost town in western Tasmania. The abandoned mining town had thrived in the late 19th century, but when the mines closed, the settlement fell into decline. 

Royal Hotel, which gained notoriety for its raucousness and one serious brawl in particular, eventually shuttered in the 1950s too. Now its crumbling carcass is a reminder of the town that once was. However, the abandoned building was bought in 2020 and plans are afoot to open a café here.

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Built by the Intercontinental Hotels chain in 1960, the Ducor Palace Hotel had 106 rooms and for many years was one of the few 5-star hotels on the African continent. It closed in 1989 due to political turmoil and since then has been damaged by two civil wars, looters and squatters, leaving it in the state of disrepair you see today.

Visitors can still access the site, where some features remain intact. The hotel's once-popular French restaurant, which had views of the Atlantic, was directly above the driveway pictured here.

Isolated in the Philippine Sea, around 178 miles (286km) south of Tokyo Hachijō-jima island was once known as the “Hawaii of Japan”. Designed to accommodate visitors during a boom in tourism in the early 1960s, the Hachijo Oriental Resort was at the heart of the island’s action and believed to be Japan's largest resort. But in 2006, thanks to dwindling tourist numbers the magnificent French Baroque building checked-in its final paying guests.

Today the hotel lies in ruins and is the preserve of adventurous explorers and squatters. The once glorious sculptured water fountain and swimming pools are empty, except for Mother Nature who is gradually taking over the whole site with lush vegetation.

It's not just resorts that lie abandoned around the world, airports can suffer the same fate too. Perhaps surprising, given their size, there are many examples of commercial airfields left to rack and ruin. One such example is Nicosia International Airport (NIM). Trapped in a 1970s-time warp, it was once the principal airport of Cyprus, welcoming hundreds of thousands of tourists a year.

On 20 July 1974, Turkey invaded Cyprus, and the country's international airport, which was the scene of fierce fighting between Turkish and Cypriot forces, was heavily bombed.

The airport was declared a United Nations Protected Area (UNPA) during the conflict and found itself within the UN-controlled buffer zone once hostilities had ceased.

Situated in a no-man's land between the Republic of Cyprus and the self-declared state of Northern Cyprus, the airport has remained largely untouched since the conflict.

This air traffic control tower with its broken windows still contains the crumbling remnants of the control consoles. It's hard to imagine that once this airport had capacity for 11 aircraft and 800 passengers at one time.

These days, the site is used as a headquarters for the UN peacekeeping force in Cyprus, but much of the former terminal building and its contents still exist, including signage and seating. While the future of the airport is uncertain, plans have been floated to re-open it under UN control and even transform the site into a special tax-free industrial zone.

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Ciudad Real Central Airport in central Spain opened in 2008 to much fanfare, but the massive infrastructure project, which cost an eye-watering £1 billion ($1.3bn) was doomed from the get-go. Stuck in the middle of nowhere, the airport's completion coincided with the global financial crisis of 2008 and resulting recession, and the hub failed to attract enough airlines to make it profitable.

Vueling, the last airline to operate scheduled flights to and from the airport, pulled out in 2011. A year later, the private airport went into receivership.

The airport, which was poised to welcome as many as 10 million passengers a year, was effectively abandoned in 2012.

An example of how not to plan a new international airport, a massive walkway was partly completed to connect the airport to a train station on the Madrid–Seville high-speed rail line that was never built and a large car park was constructed that's remained completely abandoned.

Luckily, things are looking up for the ill-fated ghost airport. In 2015 a consortium of investors snapped up the site for £37 million ($50m) and plans are afoot at last to redevelop Ciudad Real Central for commercial use. Most recently it was used by cargo planes to transport medical equipment during the coronavirus pandemic in May 2020 and some airlines stored their parked planes here too. 

How many of these defunct airports do you remember?

 

Athens' Ellinikon International Airport was the Greek capital's main airport for decades, until it was closed in 2001 to make way for the new Athens International Airport.

The airport was partly repurposed as a venue for the Athens Olympic Games in 2004, and the northwestern section of the site was used for field hockey, baseball and more.

One of the airport's hangars was even revamped to host various fencing events and basketball games. Since the Olympics, the airport has been left to rack and ruin. An ambitious project to convert the airport into a municipal park was in the pipeline but was canned following the Greek Debt Crisis that pretty much bankrupted the country.

Several plans to lease the site to investors and convert it into a sprawling coastal resort have been proposed but, to date, the airport remains abandoned and forlorn.

This major international airport near the city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip was completed with funding from the international community and opened by the then-US President Bill Clinton in 1998.

The £63.8 million ($86m) airport, which was named in honour of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, was able to handle as many as 700,000 passengers a year. The airport was in operation for a mere two years. It closed for good on 8 October 2000 during the Second Intifada.

In December 2001, an Israeli bombing campaign severely damaged the air traffic control tower, followed by the runway and the state-of-the-art terminal building. Around a month later, Israeli bulldozers moved in and destroyed much of what was left, including the runway.

Now a complete wreck, the airport has been totally abandoned and proposals to rebuild the hub have been vetoed by the Israeli authorities.

Discover more of the world's creepy abandoned airports here