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Report - - Colin's Barn aka Hobbit House 31/07/2016 | Other Sites | 28DaysLater.co.uk

Report - Colin's Barn aka Hobbit House 31/07/2016

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Thumper

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Well, where do I start. I had intended to do an early morning run this weekend but as it happens I didn't wake up until 8:30am and didn't get underway until 11:30am so I rocked up 3 hours later to 'somewhere in Wiltshire' at 2:30pm. What ensued was a real game of cat and mouse. We found the farmer ploughing the field on his tractor, he seemed to be ploughing in ever decreasing circles watching the byway the whole time, we couldn't even make it through the small gap in the hedge to get into the field and behind another hedge in time. We spotted what we believed was the barn so walked back to the car to find another way in.

Whilst in the car a lady cycled past and muttered something. She then went into the field and started speaking to the farmer looking in our direction so we scarpered. As we did so (not quick enough) a young farmer on a quad bike raced down the byway giving us the eye. Scarpering part II continued.

We parked about a mile away and face questions from an elderly chap walking his dog. We then made the long walk down in the heat. We walked all the way through a corn field carefully sticking to the edges and not trampling any crops, the whole time we could hear the tractor patrolling as well as the quad bike and the lady on her bicycle, it was laughable to be honest, talk about really not wanted!!

The corn field turned out to be a big fat failure as the very distant 'stack' in the distance turned out to be nothing more than a massive pile of pallets and scrap which remotely resembled the barn!! Scarper part III.

A local teenager came hooning down the single track road so I pulled in RIGHT by the farmers entrance and found my back wheel in the air as my car hit a massive gulley hidden by long grass. This was an epic fail as I had to be dragged out by a Land Rover but thankfully the car was OK. Scarper part IV.

I was genuinely NOT giving up on this one so I parked up again about a mile away from where I figured it could be, lumbered across more fields and by joe I found it!!

I hot footed it around the place expecting to either be shot at any moment of eaten by a Wolf, so I took as many photographs as possible on my phone, sorry they are not good quality but I left the DSLR at home so I would not be weighed down! We kept hearing the quad bike going up and down the roads, gun shots (although I think a clay shoot was on) and voices close to us so we only stayed for about 30 minutes before... scarper part V.

Overgrown, still intact, the upstairs in the main 2 storey building is quite barren now and in a reasonable to fair condition. Climbing the steps into the turret was a bit nerve wracking as dust from the ceiling was falling onto my head with every step. Something very interesting I discovered was a broken pillar which reveals the core is made of... Polystyrene!!

The bag of dog treats is a either a joke left by another urbexer or they are genuinely for a dog probably named Killer, Brutus or Tyson. There was a dismantled dog crate in there, a chewed up tennis ball and a dead Crow!

An absolutely charming and fascinating place which you can gaze at in awe for hours on end and never get bored of exploring. I do highly recommend it but you must be very 'stealth mode', it was a 3 hour drive for us and we had to try and try several routes before finally striking gold, excluding the driving we were there for over 4 hours avoiding the watchful eyes.

Photographs;

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Looking up into one of the turrets on the first floor of the main building

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When facing the 'property' this is round the back of the building on the far right

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Dog crate and the snapped pillar revealing it was polystyrene in the middle, the arches were also flaking which revealed more polysytrene

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The first floor now in a fairly bad state of disrepair

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Collapsed section of first floor, severed pillars and collapsed arches

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Genuinely could not get up into this turret, it's not what I would class as safe at all

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Lovely tiling for the mid section main entrance

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Ha ha

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Six

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
It's baffling that they'd be that bothered about people having a look....it's not like there's a huge amount there?!
 

Thumper

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Ahh the pitfuls of having a long day out, too much sun, a bit too much cider and posting the report at 1am where my laptop date read 31st! My apologies for the incorrect date!

I went back out today to do Blobbyland and didn't research it well enough so found a pile of rubble. Whoops!
 

Thumper

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Haha unfortunately most of it had been scooped up by a digger so was just white looking remnants of what was the Blobby Mansion, quite possibly the most disturbing memory from my childhood was Mr Blobby, it used to really creep me out! Then again so did Jimmy Saville!

Forgot to mention in my original post, my last trip here to Colin's Barn was a bit of a headache, I never found it as I was stopped by a lady out walking her dogs telling me to never even try it as the farmer was a horrid piece of work. As I was on my own that day I called it quits. She also told me that the majority of the locals loved the barn and were really hopeful it was still there but rumour had it the farmer had torn the place down. I was so angry to hear that I just had to go back and find out for real, thankfully it's still there and in pretty good shape, long may it continue!
 

Dan1701

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Wow that looks wicked! Where is this? Do you.know where the victorion tunnel is on portland by n e chance? Bein lookin for months now :-( lol

Easy enough really; Head up the Fosse Way from Bath and after a while, hang a right. If you suddenly find yourself on the runway of an airfield, you've gone a bit far.

As the original poster said, the locals round that way are a bit funny-like. They all know each other, and they know what sorts of cars are local and what aren't. Best thing you can do is take a tip off the crop circle makers and park up nice and legal somewhere too big for all the locals to know each others' cars, then set out pretending to be ramblers or archaeologists or somesuch; archaeology covers a multitude of sins. Failing that, try bribing the farmer to let you go look.
 

Thumper

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
LOL I went to Kemble Airfield afterwards for a nosey around, the old Brittania and Red Arrows Gnat were great!

Dan is absolutely spot on with what the locals are like. I got properly questioned by an old man out walking his dogs. Thankfully from a previous trip I came fully prepared with my plausible bullshit story which did not include Pokemon Go or Geo-caching! I was moving to the area soon and looking at some DIY livery yards and grazing for my horses (helps being a horsey person and worker), stopped off at the pub for lunch and decided to burn some calories off in this beautiful village with the byways for easy parking. Then ask in great detail questions about the area and not seem too bothered about being held up talking shite. How plausible that was I don't know but he seemed satisfied and after the intial hostility turned very friendly and chatty. The old biddy on the bicycle though was on the case. I drove past her, she followed me up the byway and then went to "report me" to the farmer ploughing his field, the son then came hooning along on his quad bike and followed us for quite some time and continued to 'patrol'. The farmer does not take bribery, it's been offered before and the answer was "F OFF". The whole saga is laughably ridiculous!

Accidentally 'parking' my car in a ditch was the best move of the day though. I simply parked it up right by the nearest road to the barn looking at it in disdain and telling people it was OK I had breakdown recovery which would take a few hours and where was the nearest shop so I could go and buy some drinks (it was a very hot day when I went). Simply walk off towards the shop and then dive through a hedge when no-one is looking :D

So many tunnels on Portland, if you mean the Cheyne Tunnel below the pumping station then you won't find it as the entrance is permanently blocked by a substantial collapse of the cliff face. There's a really steep one somewhere which the entrance is just a manhole cover, no idea where that one is. I'm afraid tunnels don't interest me in person as I suffer from claustraphobia!
 

Lavino

................
28DL Full Member
i wouldn't mind having a look around this place tho it does look quite small :D
 
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Thumper

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
I don't know why you are seeing small photographs Lavino, I did resize them to 1024 pixels in width or height so they did not overwhelm the screen but they certainly come up full size on my laptop!
 

BrainL

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Looks a cool place this, always enjoy looking at pics from here when it pops up :)

Think Lavino meant the size of the actual building rather than your pics mate :)
 

Thumper

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Yep, Lavino has edited the post now, it earlier read as small photographs taken using perhaps a small camera, perhaps there was a fault with Flickr as that's who I use to host. The building is actually quite vast, here's a shot with me in the foreground which only shows half of the building, yes that is my best side ;)

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