Battery Steele, Peaks Island

Dang Peaks Island hoodlums!

Rob and Ging going into a dark tunnel.

Emily going into a dark tunnel.

Rob in a narrow side hall.

Freaky!

Graffiti everywhere.

Didn’t know Phil was there til my flash went off.

Back side of the bunker area.

We climbed up a tiny wooded trail to the topside of the bunker where we found this air vent.

Dark now. Standing on the top of the bunker.

During World War II, a large military defense installation was built on Peaks Island. There are bunkers and batteries and observation towers and more, I’m sure. Phil told me that there were observation areas out in the water, looking for submarines and then guns on the island that would shoot. Or that was the plan. When they tested the guns windows all the way on the opposite side of the island shattered. He said it was not used after that. Some of the ruins are privately owned, and some are just there and you can go in. Maybe those are privately owned, but the owners don’t care? I’m not sure.

We went to the Battery Steele area. It is in this overgrown woods and almost all the way covered except for the entry ways. There are long tunnels with rooms and halls going off this way and that. You couldn’t see a thing in there. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face, which was scary. Scarier was the fact that there were some small votives lit in the tunnel. The kind that don’t burn long, so someone had been in there just before us. Even scarier was when Ging and I were stumbling along in the dark and Billy and Dallas jumped out of somewhere and started yelling at us. Ging and I just started screaming. So spooky. Rob had two tiny flashlights, but most of us were just wandering around in the dark trying use our cell phones or cameras to see. It was creepy that we couldn’t see anything but when I’d light up a wall with my flash it would be covered with graffiti or we’d see one of our friends walking that we didn’t even know was there. Everything was all strobe-y, which added to the scary factor.

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