Rambling around Richmond

On Saturday, I drove down to Fredericksburg to meet with Emily, Margie and Richard plus Robert, another urbexer from the DC group. We were exploring Richmond and meeting other explorers for breakfast. As I was driving through Front Royal I spotted a hiker with his thumb out so promptly pulled over. He wanted a ride to the trail which was a couple of miles away and all uphill to get there. Chris, or Cuss, as he's known on the trail, is from Sweden and was heading north, having begun his hike from Georgia on April 14th. He wasn't sure if he was going to make it to Maine as he was having problems, which he didn't reveal to me and I didn't like to probe. But he'd had a couple of days break in FroRo and was feeling refreshed, with new shoes and his supplies replenished. We chatted and laughed and I wished him luck as I dropped him off, praising him for his stamina and determination. He shrugged, fist bumped me and with a grin as he climbed out of the car, he looked back and said, "Man makes plans and the gods are laughing." Waving, he turned his back and continued on The Appalachian Trail. I love these hikers, they are mostly fine examples of humanity, showing bravery, persistence, creativity, unity and responsibility, to name a few. I envy their months on the trail, knowing I don't have the time or the funds to even think about it, or if I'm honest, their drive, but I revel in firsthand experiences like this. I hope he makes it.
I met the others and soon we were on our way to Richmond. We hadn't been here for a while and I held no grand ideas about finding any mind blowing abandonments, but we parked up near the James River and walked out to look at an old iron works.

We couldn't get too close from our position so gave up, watching instead the multitude of grown men playing with their radio controlled vehicles, trying to get them round an 'assault course' on the rocks. Deep discussions were taking place as they earnestly reviewed crevasses and cracks in the rocks and the depth of water in the puddles.
We backtracked and made our way further along the trail so we could cross over the bridge to Belle Isle. At this point we lost Margie, but couldn't worry too much as she often wanders off and never has her phone turned on.
Belle Isle is now a popular park area, once an industrial area with the iron works, a power plant and a nail factory as well as a granite quarry. Now it's for leisure only with walking trails, ruins and lots of areas to access the flat rocks that spread across the James River.

By walking onto Belle Isle we managed to access Tredegar Iron Works where we found some kids enjoying a doobie, one of whom heaped high praise on me regarding my Roland Rat t-shirt. I liked him. There wasn't much to see here but it is noteworthy since the site built over half of the cannons used by the Confederacy during The Civil War.

It was blazing hot but much of the trail had shady woodlands sheltering us, offering a noticeable drop in temperature under the canopy. We strolled around the ruins, eagerly ducking under anything that had a roof, relishing the shade.
The brick arches above once had mules pulling scrap iron from England, probably around 1815-1900. European migrants and slaves were the labor in this nail factory, also famous throughout the South for its horseshoes.
The skeleton above is known as the Chrysler Building, used during WWI to build tank hatches for Chrysler Motors. It was also one of the first buildings to be constructed by Old Dominion Iron and Steel Company, the still standing rusting structure proof of the fine casting that the company was famous for.

These were 2 police officers, their boat holding 2 bicycles which they were going to patrol the island on. I wished I had my bike, it would be a pleasant way to explore the whole island. Eventually the lack of things to explore and the intense heat had lulled us into a lazy saunter compelling us to consider a return to the cars, and then we'd walk about downtown, hoping to find more interesting scenes to photograph.

As we left the island, Margie appeared, non the worse for her disappearance, and not the least bit concerned that she'd been 'missing' for the best part of an hour. As I left the bridge a couple walked past me, the girl dressed up in tight plastic and leather gear with 5 inch heels. She had to be hot but as she passed the rest of the crew still on their way up the stairs, they stopped her for photos and I took a shot of them shooting her. She and her friend were taking photos by the river. Rather her than me negotiating those rocks in stiletto heels!

We drove downtown and parked near the Milk Bottle building, which I'd been itching to see firsthand. This had once been Richmond Dairy Company but now is 113 apartments. I wish they'd kept the logo on the bottles...

We sauntered about the back streets, finding old ghost signs on buildings and interesting windows to peer in. I was quite taken with the GWAR windows, a heavy metal themed restaurant which I would have loved to eat in, but I knew the others had no interest in it. On researching it, I found it was rated quite highly so it will be a port of call when I next come to Richmond with rock music loving buddies.

 There were plenty of curiosities to stare at as we walked about. Wonderful old neon signs and store fronts, an art deco abandoned building that we were disappointed to find no access to, murals and even an Alice in Wonderland pop-up bar, but a quick walk in had us spinning on our heels and exiting, it hadn't been put together well. I loved our group photo in the window, Richard proudly clutching his latest acquisition, a Mrs Miller greatest hits album. We played her 'songs' on our phones as we walked around, doubled up laughing at her screeching and poorly timed renditions of once loved old time hits. Downtown was my favoritist, listen here.
Inevitably, with all our walking we'd worked up a thirst and our attention soon turned to beer. And so a mini tour began, much to the chagrin of our 5th member, Robert, who huffed and puffed, and winged and whined as we supped our favorite tipples. By the time we got to the third brewery he had had enough and blustered that he was pissed, in the angry sense and not the 'too much alcoholic consumption' sense. So we wistfully cut our pleasure short and clinked our glasses together for the final time that day. It was dusk as we headed north towards our homes but even despite the lack of urbexing and the excess of Robert we'd still managed to have a few laughs and snap some acceptable photos.