Your
attention then turns to a little outpost nearby - like a sentry box.
This very small white building has a couple of steps leading up to
it, so you can stand inside and imagine what it must have been like
keeping tabs on the comings and goings of a working hospital from
here.
Clambering
back down from the sentry post, you find yourself standing on a cracking
concrete road which has the same feel as a windswept overgrown WWII
airfield - possibly because it is quite contemporary with such a construction.
You can even make out some old parking bays.
Your
attention now returns to the most imposing feature of the surrounding
landscape - the main facade itself. You can't fail to notice how impressive
this looks. Here you are, surrounded by forest, effectively in the
middle of nowhere, and here is this enormous grand white building.
To say that it beckons you is an understatement.
As
illustrated below, the entrance looms as you wander into the vast
shadow cast by its tall triangular parapet - easily visible to whatever
happens to be lurking around the windows on the top floor.
We
arrive at the main entrance doors - a somewhat minor affair when compared
to the lavish foyers of modern public buildings. It is hard to imagine
a stretcher being rushed in through here whilst someone holds the
doors open (although I suspect that emergency patients would have
actually been brought in through one of the entry points either side
of the main building). As you can see, the doors are a grim turquoise
and would be more at home in a factory than a hospital. Throughout
our earlier visits these doors were chained shut, however, somewhere
along the line they had been forced open once again by persons unknown.
Before
the doors were opened, the only way in around here was to their right.
If you look just past the commemorative stone plaque (the text of
which appears a couple of times elsewhere on this site) you will notice
a window that is always slightly ajar. Climb in through here to enter
the wonderful world of the CRCMH.
The
first object you'll notice once inside is a bizarre contraption bolted
to the floor (indeed, you'll probably graze your arm on it whilst
hopping through the window if you're not careful). It looks like it
should belong in a dental surgery, and has a strange glass vial full
of putrid liquid attached to it. From here, it's only a few steps
through the door and out into the main foyer itself.
Here,
little of interest remains but trash (and a disused safe) inside what
was once the reception. Perhaps because it has always been the most
obvious place to "loot" - for many, their first point of
contact with the disused building. Exploring the foyer, you will instantly
notice that it leads right out into a central open courtyard.
If
you poke your head out of the western end of the room, you'll notice
an interesting and somewhat enticing little corridor that leads off
to the X-Ray Department - in the direction that any would-be Flincher
hunter would need to explore. The stretcher has been there for as
long as we've known the place. But we'll leave that path for now.
If
you head back into the foyer again, you will also discover a flight
of stairs off to the south. These are a very rare occurence within
the CRCMH - indeed, there's only one other place in the entire complex
with an upstairs, which we'll get to later. But for now, let's make
our way upstairs to the top floor of the main building...