{"id":23386,"date":"2025-03-14T20:51:11","date_gmt":"2025-03-14T20:51:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetimechamber.co.uk\/beta\/?p=23386"},"modified":"2025-06-11T13:04:57","modified_gmt":"2025-06-11T13:04:57","slug":"whats-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetimechamber.co.uk\/beta\/blog\/whats-next","title":{"rendered":"What’s next?"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

In this episode we grumble on about those damn kids these days, what we should do with our website and get lost as our train of thought unravels into a word soup of half thought out ideas.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\r\n

As we settled into the well-worn seats of a London pub on a damp February evening, we found ourselves deep in conversation with another explorer, reminiscing about past adventures when the creeping realisation dawned on us that we might be…..aging? For nearly two decades we have found ourselves slipping under the rusting fences of derelict buildings in order to chase the heady mix of both adrenaline and decay. But as time has worn on we\u2019ve shifted our approach; we only venture out when the itch becomes too strong to ignore. Between beers, our discussion circled a question that has lurked at the edges of our minds for a while: how do you reclaim the thrill of those first explorations? Do you push yourself toward riskier, more dangerous feats? (Sidebar: no, we both have a mortgage) Do you disconnect from the internet, hoping that absence will make the locations feel fresh again? (Also no) On the train home another question grew out of the conversation – after 18 years of running this website, where does it go next?<\/p>\r\n

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Why does the website feel redundant?<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We don’t know in all honesty. The website will remain online for as long as we can maintain the hosting, but whether the slow trickle of updates and blog posts continues is something we haven\u2019t decided. At our current rate of production the next blog post will land somewhere around 2028. At this point, we’ve completely lost the motivation for adding new pages about places we\u2019ve explored as it feels pretty redundant. Most of them are already well-documented across forums, blogs, and terrible YouTube videos. The last decade or so has seen a huge growth in the role of social media for explorers, which has also contributed to our website losing its shine. What once felt unique is now no longer a niche hobby.<\/p>\r\n

We have a few theories as to why we have lost interest, other than our care free teenage years have becoming a distant memory. Aside from the usual grumbling about social media ruining everything, the lack of, and our own drive to find obscured, long-abandoned buildings is a major factor. Back in 2007, derelict asylums, vast decaying industrial sites, and an assortment of other places that had sat forgotten for years, sat there waiting to be used as our playground. We loved capturing nature slowly reclaiming these spaces, but over time, they disappeared; either replaced by new housing, being better secured, or demolished before they could become a liability.\u00a0 We have little interest in venturing into places that have only recently closed. One unproven theory we’ve have is the explosion of urban exploring on social media, a few high-profile rooftop climbers getting into trouble, and countless news articles have all combined to make developers and property owners take urban explorers more seriously. Suddenly, they weren\u2019t just worrying about metal thieves, they had to deal with photographers and influencers sneaking in for clout. This has meant that places we like to look at have become more and more scarce in the UK, and some of the most impressive places to explore in recent years have been well beyond our comfort zone.<\/p>\r\n

We still get a kick out of sneaking around places we probably shouldn\u2019t be, snapping a few photos, and sharing them with a handful of friends on social media (yeah, yeah, we know). It\u2019s in our nature to want to share. But why post them here for the whole world to see? And why hand out so much information? Our Instagram reels are flooded with accounts hyping up derelict locations as “hidden gems” and must-visit spots. Dinorwic, in particular, has been everywhere since Covid with influencers pushing it as a top destination in North Wales. And while it is<\/em> a fascinating place, but it’s unlikely the unique UNESCO site will survive the surge in foot traffic for much longer. Not to sound like a grumpy old man gatekeeping his playground, but most people have no idea what they\u2019re doing in these places. Mountain rescue has been called out to Dinorwic multiple times over the last few summers for groups that got in way over their heads. Same story with Box Quarry, it had to be heavily sealed after too many people wandered in, inspired by a few flashy Facebook posts, and then got lost underground (ahem<\/a>). Fair play to them for letting someone know they were underground and making proper arrangements.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n

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In the UK, the tendency to name every site and spill all the details only makes them more vulnerable to the wrong crowd (not that they don\u2019t already know about them, to be fair). Sharing somewhere immediately to social media or our website doesn\u2019t sit right with us either as this inevitably leads to places getting swarmed by ants, trashed, sealed up, or even burnt down before we\u2019ve had a chance to properly sort our photos. Case in point: as we try and write this post, a ROTOR bunker in the southeast was barely open before it became a full-blown tourist trap and them quickly sealed by very large concrete blocks. This kind of thing has always happened in one form or another, but the speed at which word spreads now – and the ensuing free-for-all – feels particularly desperate.<\/p>\r\n

Do people even care for blog posts and websites like this anymore?<\/p>\r\n

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So what comes next?<\/h2>\r\n

So after all the preamble, what do we do with our website next? It\u2019s clearly not our primary concern anymore and we are very slow to update it. We have a few ideas and one train of thought is to keep the blog active and occasionally post an update, such as our European Minerals post<\/a>. We like the idea of producing a few detailed histories of some of the places we have visited and have found engaging, especially if there isn\u2019t a great history of them online. With this, we are thinking of overhauling a few of the more detailed pages, such as the ROTOR page, to round out the information they contain. If we feel energetic <\/span>we’ll probably give the look of the website a little refresh, remove some old pages and slim down the photo count. <\/span>The other idea is to leave it as an archive of our past activities and wander off!<\/span><\/p>\r\n

<\/p>\r\n

It’s in our own remit to find our own enthusiasm and get back out there and squeeze under the miles of fence that string their way across the UK landscape and rediscover what we once enjoyed.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n

Turns out if you dig into our blog posts, we have written something similar before…<\/a><\/em><\/p>\r\n

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<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this episode we grumble on about those damn kids these days, what we should do with our website and get lost as our train of thought unravels into a word soup of half thought out ideas.\u00a0 As we settled into the well-worn seats of a London pub on a damp February evening, we found … <\/p>\n

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