Image via Jordan Liles
This is how horror movies start.
That's the one thing you will be thinking as you travel with Jordan Liles on a video tour of Tennessee Wonderland, an abandoned area featuring now dilapidated houses and a hotel in the state's Great Smoky Mountains.
The video below from Liles is over 20 minutes, but it's well worth your time. While taken back in 2013, the Internet, like a hiker happening upon a deserted oasis, is finding it anew. Thanks to Fox 8 Cleveland, The Huffington Post and many more, we can enjoy what is truly a marvelous find.
The video has a very Blair Witch, Cabin in the Woods, Evil Dead feel to it.
At the 18:13-minute mark, Liles provides a beautiful contrast between the hotel area during its prime years and the current overgrown forest it has become. With the music and the populated pictures dissolving to nothingness, the moment might remind of the Overlook Hotel and the final scene from The Shining. Then again, those not on a morose kick might just see beauty.
In any case, you can't take your eyes off the screen.
A simple hike around a once-vibrant resort leads to encounters with houses that have all seen better days. Locks are smashed, rooftops deteriorate, fountains no longer spray water for the enjoyment of those around and floorboards creak with the possibility of collapse.
As Liles mentions in his blog, a good amount of the buildings shot in the video were, "constructed more than 100 years ago." Now they are getting new life thanks to a quick jaunt along creepy yet stunning paths.
Fortunately, its history is not so mysterious. A Wikipedia entry fills in the blanks for those curious:
"The Wonderland Hotel lease expired in 1992. On November 15, 1992 the Wonderland Hotel saw its last day of operation. In 1995 the Hotel was partially lost to a fire. In 2005, the remnants of the Hotel collapsed, and the National Park Service awarded a $65,419 contract to Moran Construction of Abingdon, Virginia to begin carefully dismantling the remains of the collapsed hotel. The historically significant doors, windows, bathtubs and other artifacts were set aside for permanent preservation in November 2006."
This isn't the only video of its kind from Liles, because he also walked through the abandoned Divi Tiara Beach Resort in Cayman Brac:
Who ordered the zombie apocalypse?
Like something out of a video game, Liles meanders about a resort whose only inhabitant is nature, quickly erasing all signs that tourists once enjoyed its confines.
It seems vacation hotspots are far more fascinating when you clear them of those pesky humans mucking about.
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