Birthday exploration: Abandoned military base (Hellenic air force)

"One day you'll spend (part of) your birthday exploring an abandoned airbase"

The above phrase would crack me up have it reached my ears before I decided to evolve my travelling "career" but since I started taking a trip on every birthday of mine no such predictions can impress me anymore.

The nearest town to my destination is Keratea and though I have visited it countless times I had no idea there's a thing like that on the top of the nearest hill - you may also call this a mountain as it's around 600m high. As I take the winding road up I am already excited to drive on a narrow military road that is not wide enough for two vehicles but the view it offers is wonderful though the kinda hazy early morning didn't help capturing the beauty:

After a longer than expected drive I finally arrive at the abandoned base where its entrance instantly offers a post apocalyptic impression:

Same from the inside despite the efforts of nature in the background:

Once a top guarded base and critical part of Athens's air defence it's now left unattended for more than 2 decades as the current ground to air missiles are located at another spot.

Here's what once used to be the entrance's guard room:

Opposite side is the guard's post,

and behind it is this building which used to host the main power switch - you can see it's lever right in the middle:

It's all bare inside except only a few electric parts not worth removing/stealing:

Ugly inside but beautiful view outside:

Time to have a closer look to the rest of the base:

Judging by the location and the shape of this concrete construction it probably used to host a gun:

Funny how nature around it is in a much more pacific mood with lovely flowers like these:

Worth	clicking	to enlarge

Here's another guard room with uninterrupted view including the beach of Anavyssos:

Not a bad place at all to do your army service, at least as long as there's no war:

I leave this beauty behind to explore what looks like the main building:

From the first steps I take inside it is obvious that it's much worse (or even worse if you like) indoors (no doors left actually) than it's exterior's state:

The wall on the left reads in Greek "Tell me the best lie:

The hall is dreadful too:

Same as all the rooms it leads to:

This used to be the kitchen:

All the dark stuff you see on the floor is sheep/goat shit:

Probably the local shepherds found a great shelter for their animals from the wildfires of the last summer or they tend to keep their herds there from time to time anyway:

Someone missed the bloodshed of war since luckily we haven't experienced any:

More shitty rooms and more shit literally and metaphorically:

In the largest room of this building I found rubber marks on the floor from guys spinning out their bikes:

Total contrast of the interior with the superb view these empty rooms offer:

I take one shot outside of this mess before I move on to check out the rest:

You can leave your opinion about this table in the comments below :)

A few steps away I find this bunker:

Rather small, you can watch a clip of it in the video that follows.

Time to see what this building hides inside:

This time the mess is followed by some artistic attempts:

Never underestimate the art power of nature though peeling off the paint:

Before I leave behind this building I can't skip picturing the way the sky complements this pair of pine trees:

Moving up to the top of the base I see more gun posts - usually these things come with a nice view:

I have no idea how this thing ended up like this:

It looks like an act of war but I can assure you it wasn't.

I move on to see the rest bits of this complex:

As I step inside a similar mess waits again:

In the following room someone felt the need to inform as that "Viky is hot" in the more slung way possible. Funny how (probably) the guy who did the red pentacle on the right felt like trying to erase the slung part of that writing. Absurdity meets hilariousness:

Stepping out of this room I spot the best artwork so far on the right:

Deserves a closer look:

The rest of the rooms I enter struggle with abandonment and hilarious use of paint:

The view outside is still nice:

But only until your eye falls on one of the relics around like this which is also the biggest one:

Here's how it looks inside:

Time to see what this one is about:

On my way to reach it I find one more gun post, also with nice view:

Despite the haze which doesn't help:

Before I arrive at the building with the satellite dish I showed you before I find a smaller one at the end of a gravel path which attracts me due to its nice graffiti:

Once upon a time it used to have this door:

Now it's just an empty room with a view:

I take the gravel path back up again,

and I'm right at my next target:

Once again, empty rooms with a view:

A closer look to its satellite dish makes it obvious that some guys had some shooting fun on it:

Time to leave all this place behind and take the winding road back down. In the middle of nowhere I find this stone construction:

Not sure exactly what it used to be but to my surprise I find out that someone took (or still takes) care of some young trees at the spot:

Quite odd, there's absolutely nothing around in a radius of many km.

Here's video of all the above plus part of my ride going down:

This is the first time I didn't go hunting entirely for beauty on my birthday but hope you enjoyed it anyway 🙂