Mission Impossible, like literally

Everyone has watched on of those movies where the ninjas/thieves/charlie's angels break into a highly secured complex, with cameras, infra-red sensors, patrolling security in the middle of the night. But how many of us can actually say we've done it?

Getting told a list of all the people getting arrested having unsuccessfully tried to break into this gigantic power plant did not convince me to go in. However a bunch of seals did. The only way into this highly secured complex was through the back. And how? We had to walk through a go-cart track, push our way through half an hour of dark forest, climb some rocks by the sea then VOILA. That was the easy part. 

We had to teamwork our way through the barbed wire fence, tore a hole in my pants and sustained a few cuts. At that point I stayed and pondered if I wanted to get arrested, just having paid for my tickets to Taiwan the next week, whilst my urbex team left me by some seals and went to figure out how to enter the tightly secured building. Half an hour later, the seals seemed to have screamed YOLO at me so I got up asked Tansix for directions via text message and I was off. 

This was a thermal power station built in the 1970's to meet the increasing power demand of NZ. But because of more recent, more efficient plants being built recently, this one was officially shut down in 2007. Especially because much of the machinery was cladded with asbestos. And YES that's a 200m tall tower with more than a million bricks!

There is still multimillion dollars of machinery in there, so the owners employ security to patrol the grounds and they keep the facility brightly lit to keep robbers and trespassers (like us) away.  

What I saw before I decided to take a risk and ninja in. So I had to tiptoe behind shadows of various warehouses, avoid sensors/cameras, crawl across a rusty bridge, climb off a platform, sprint across an exposed spot and climb three ladders climb through a fire exit (all in silence) before I found my team. Should have recorded it, it would've looked like a mission impossible movie!

The inside consisted of four parts:

1. The City of Metal. The vibes I got from this was a mix of some Studio Ghibli fantasyland, the inside of a submarine and kowloon walled city. 

I call it "city" because of the 7 levels of maze like pathways that were lit at regular intervals by street lamp looking lights.

Lost myself in this almost beautiful metallic labyrinth.

Imagine this but a hundred times bigger

Wish we could stay longer, but every second we were in here was a second that security could run into us.

2. The locker room

A whole floor dedicated to metal cabinets filled with a collection of different valves, meters and other curious devices. With an equally curiously Swedish sauna wooden theme!

At least 50 of these metal beings

I was tempted to turn it on, to see if something would explode.

An engineer/physicist can explain this to me, other wise to me it's a giant xylophone!

3. Ze Control Room

We were crazily flicking the switches, trying to see if anything did anything! 

This is just a third of the control room! There must be 10 of these Star Trek looking stations around!

Wonder what these TV looking things are!

I thought only nuclear power plants would have this, but even thermal energy plants may explode!

Me and my iPhone 5 camera taking a picture of what looks like a seismograph.

4. The almighty GENERATORS

They look like giant minions off Despicable Me!

Need I say more? 

And then we quietly (but extremely hyped) tiptoed over the way we ninja-ed in. 

Carbonisation Plant VS Zombies

First leg of this urbex roadtrip and I'm blown away already, shows how we all need to get our of Auckland once in a while!

This place was so worth getting stabbed by overgrown gorse bushes, we practically cried our way through five minutes of those evil thorns to get to this amazing location

This place used to be a small coal mining town in the early 1900's but now all that remains is this coal processing carbonisation plant, which has operated to the 1985.

This plant was the first of it's kind in the Southern Hemisphere, super high tech for 1930. But it heavily polluted the surroundings, so by 1985 when there was a big explosion this place was closed for good. It remain super hazardously toxic and the government only decided to clean it up in 2006, by flooding it. (Hence the submersion, we had to ninja ourselves up a balcony to avoid this noxious slump)

Literally EVERYTHING was rusted. Even the floor we stood on, so we had to float like a butterfly in hope we don't fall into the toxic pool. I guess they didn't have stainless steel in the 1930's did they?

What a smashing view from the top floor. Was even better in real life, have to see it for yourself!

Anybody keen for a rollercoaster ride?

Hi rusted wardrobe box thing!

Giant incinerator, I'd make my pizza here if it wasn't going to poison me!

360 degrees of picture-perfect views from this less than perfect building, how ironic!

Home, obsolete, home

I remember the life before coming to the land of the long white clouds, I'd play hide and seek with my grandfather in this grotesque looking animal heads... 

Now that he's gone, my childhood memories are also crumbling apart...

That patch of green grass was where I was last happy; truly happy. Not the fake shit I put on these days. Too bad the wrecking ball came in too quickly for my building and all there's left is grass.

But hey I managed to get past security on the adjacent building by going thru the underground carpark, climbed 16 flights of stairs then peered down the edge. To see the last of my childhood fantasyland of frog heads. 

Standing on a Panda's Head

Roof of the 30 Floor Panda Hotel, Hong Kong

We need some pink buildings here in Auckland, don't we?

View of my third hometown of Tseun Wan

Wonder what it would feel like diving into the pool from up here?

Fifth Forgotten: The Piano Place

I always had this fantasy in the back of my mind to play an abandoned piano. 

And with Mendelssohn's Song Without Words that I remember from another lifetime I ticked this off the bucket list!

But aside from that fact, this central ex-English language school of 4 empty floors didn't have too much of a "wow" factor...

Lone chair watching the sad busy world go by. I wish I could do that...

What the chair could see!

This place had a ballroom kind of vibe. Just missing some soul for me to dance with....

Kitchens had its guts and soul ripped out. It can make ghost chips tho (joke for the kiwis out there!) 

10 year old toiletries and a sink full of pigeon crap. That's about as exciting as it got..

And some fresh air.

And yes this was how I figured this used to be English school in 2002

Another odd rooftop

McDonald's Midnight Madness

Fourth Step Too Late: Brewery

Nike said "Just do it" 

I didn't. 

By the time I did, it was almost too late. The iconic Lion Breweries which have been standing in Newmarket for nearly a century was already half ploughed down by bulldozers... 

But never fear, I still managed to capture remnants from the original home of NZ Beer. 

Oh no! I got beer in my eye, what to do, what to do?!

Giant three story warehouse, with these giant holes in them! Used to hold giant barrels of hops for fermentation into beer. 

Ok, yes I know it's not convincing that I went to a brewery, for all you know I could've just gone to any old pile of rubble and said it's a brewery. Here's the proof. 

Thankfully the office building was still fully intact. I was greeted by asbestos warnings and a marble Captain Cook. How sad, everyone left James behind...

Office building corridor. I went inside a few offices. Read through boxes of meeting notes from 2001 blah blah blah... Nothing that mind-blowing. 

Learnt my lesson. Just do it. 

The odd roof

Oh and did I mention I enjoy climbing stairs?

Third Time Lucky: The Vaults

Because of the my spontaneous nature, I only came to the vaults with 13% phone battery and paper thin shoes with holes in them. I had to hurriedly snap some photos before my battery would run out and I'd be stranded in a pitch-black, underground maze like complex without my phone torch. 

So what am I going on about with "the vaults"? 

Most people don't believe me, but hell yeah it used to be the Reserve Bank of New Zealand. Where the New Zealand Government used to keep all its cash assets and gold bars. And if you're wondering, no not a cent was left when I went there! Only in 2006 the Reserve Bank was moved to Wellington and having lain derelict for several years it was time for me to explore this underground world which used to hold millions. 

Third time lucky: The previous two times I tried to get through: 

#1 Door was jammed shut no matter how many karate kicks I gave it.

#2 Club bouncers and hobos on the street watching me trying to break in through corrugated iron gap. Either way I'd get in trouble with either the law or the law-less and had to call it quits. 

#3 Had to enlist the help of Tansix, realised I'd probably get lost in this maze myself.  

So we went down two flights of stairs to go underground. Then went around in circles tip-toeing through in really skinny tunnels. Lo and behold handfuls of gigantic safes like this one.

And this one. Too bad the government didn't leave a gold bar for me!

Some 70's looking contraption by the elevators

This is how thick the mini-door to each safe was! Few times how fat I was!

Once you pulled the metal grate in front of the door up, these dim lights would come on, and yes the building still had electricity! But all good, the government is paying for it anyway. 

What the door looks like, if you wondered. Big heavy door with a lot of momentum. I tried to push one with all my energy. It literally moved 0.0001cm. Then gained momentum then uncontrollably slammed shut. 

Once we got sick of slamming vault doors shut we trekked through 13 floors of emptied office buildings. The top floor used to be hired to Telecom and we still found dozens of cabinets of electrical motherboards with their LED's still flashing!

The pretty blue and orange themed boiler room suggests this building was of the 70's. There were 5-6 of these lying around and I felt like I was in Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory somehow!

And a beautiful rooftop view to end the evening. 

It's a pity that was my first and last chance to visit something so rare, it is now under demolition to become a hotel.