Tales of the Urban Explorer: The Church of Christ the King
Things had changed, the shrubbery had been cut back and you could now walk around 'The Church of Christ the King' without being shredded to ribbons.
While some may hail this as a good thing, it's hardly a welcome sight and is the first stage of an internal clear-out or worse, demolition.
The latter word strikes a sense of fear and doom into Urban Explorers. Another location gone forever replaced by a row of plastic houses made out of ticky-tacky. That’s from some song I remember as a child, they were doing it even then.
Three years ago, @dizzydiscovery and me had paid this wreck of a church a visit and failed dismally to get inside. Every window had been securely covered by fresh boards, probably the same ones you can see in this image.
![image.png](https://images.hive.blog/768x0/https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/slobberchops/EokddKFtQTUaHoCAuUFU9V7PBu5XzYdrntuUQm1WxQHxC7CNDZNSSQazWYniGArHVHv.jpg)
...'better days when 'old' people used to attend and the inside didn't look like a complete shithole'...
Source
The former Church of Christ the King, between the Leeds-Liverpool Canal and Bradford Road in Sandbeds, near Bingley, has been empty since it shut in 2006.
The church and land was sold at an auction for the guide price of £700,000 in early 2024.
£700,000, it’s not a bad price considering the amount of land this includes. According to the article, 13 houses 'could' be built on the land. Note the emphasised word, I never believe what they say.
We scoured the back in vain, noting the faded worn look on the wooden coverings and hoped someone had yanked a rotting board off; no such luck.
Our break came on the front, a most unusual access point and in full visibility of passing cars and the nearby Karen’s from the housing estate located to the right.
“Must be the demented demolition team who pulled this one off", I mentioned in a passing comment to @anidiotexplores who was wasting no time in climbing through this very awkward window.
From the inside it looks easy but from other side there was no step to assist unless you call a sloped stone jutting edge ‘help’ and the climb was taller than what you see.
To make things worse, this was thin but strong wood, making a nice slice in my ball-sack, well… this again, it’s hardly the first time and fortunately, I have no future plans to have more children.
While the old church was showing more than elementary signs of decay, it was also covered in extremely crap graffiti telling me the local wankers have been inside on numerous occasions.
If I adhered to all these helpful 'instructions' given to me within abandoned buildings, I would be missing numerous limbs and wearing a permanent eyepatch a la' Long John Silver.
This is the scene you would be looking at if praying from the back of ‘The Church of Christ the King’. Myopics could feasibly mistake those badly drawn feline images with Jesus himself, and the extremely long and thin cock for a red divine godly rod.
…’too long is not always better I have been told from my female friends…, it kind of hurts’…
Don't ask.., as you won't believe my explanation.
The books were so badly mashed it was tough to figure out their contents. One appears to contain funeral advertisement and diocese annual reviews, the other a barely identifiable bible.
From February 1993, here’s a selection of the services on offer. I thought the dedicated went to church only on Sundays.
More reading material and it’s of the correct literary type being present and strewn on the floor.
A close view of where your local vicar would lead his flock. I am not sure whether that is a cock or not, looking a little closer.
What was catching my eye was that ladder. If only it had been on the other side of that bastard window, I would not be leaking sperm again from my balls. I made a conscious note to grab this handy climbing aid for an easier escape.
Empty and desolate; the main room of worship within ‘The Church of Christ the King’ emitted some atmosphere despite the despoilment.
This was not one of those churches where the priest, vicar or whatever else they are named live there. Besides this filthy tearoom, there was little else to it.
Further advancement into this room required you to be a skinny bastard. It would be woeful and miserable experience if ‘Father Fatty' was posted here by the regional diocese board.
Then again when the room beyond is like this, there’s little reason to breathe in hard to rummage about.
These churches generally have fancy organs, this looked a little on the cheap side and you can forget even a single note coming out of it.
Totally fucked, though I did have a go.
This hymn book has miraculously escaped the vandals and was quite intact. I placed it next to the window so the next lot of dickheads who arrive can redeem themselves with heavenly prayers and hymns.
These dusty, cobweb-infested stairs looked promising but led to a super small room with absolutely nothing worth wasting phone space on.
Where were the church bells, you can’t expect the flock to attend without those?
Let’s say that getting out was a fucking lot easier than the painful entrance. We left the ladders outside but hidden under a nearby bush. The next lot of explorers may notice them.
Vandals, paint-sprayers, thieves, general cunts don’t have the aptitude to notice such aids.
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The Church still looked kinda neat even though it’s abandoned and somehow neater than the places you have showed us in the past
That’s a nice adventure though
Do you wear face mask when going to places like this because of dust?
No, I inhale all that terrible air, my body has got used to it.., nose blind as we name it here.
700k is a good price but then you’ll still have a lot of work to do in it.
Regardless, I think it’s a fair trade.
A decent explore, £700K seems OK for a church to convert, you could make a damned nice house out of that will enough readies. How much land....?
You could leave some of the key features like the cock graffiti when renovating.
There's a decent chunk, but it's not quite flat.
Artistic merits.., perhaps?!
More like historic legacy, style of cock graffiti vary with location and historical period, at least according to a thesis I was reading the other day.
Now, that reminds me of that one scene in Taxi Driver with Travis monologuing about the animals that come out at night. One day, a real rain will come.
Wouldn't it'd be great if all the turds could leave these places alone instead of showing of there poor gross and fine motor skills?
Yes, but it's a pastime for Gen-Z's here to fuck over places, I have seen it myself several times.. LIVE action. It's best to just say,'alright' and move along unless you want to be the next target.
Is it fuck!
thats why we do it, isn't it even the almighty didn't strike you down.
PS someone has nicked the snooker balls!!!!!!
I know, I was hoping for a game (in the dark). 😞
me too !
Despite the fact that the property is literally “abandoned”, is it legal in your country to enter such places without authorisation? The fact that it is abandoned does not mean that it has no owner, I ask?
No it's not legal but it's also not considered a criminal act. The cops will tell you to leave, unless you get an arsehole cop, then they might take you down to the station for a few hours for little reason than to be a dick.
Ended up being pretty lame for a church. I was hoping you might stumble on the ark of the covenant or something.
Not so good, but I will take another church. I don't have too many.., I am at just 15...
It was a nice adventure but I have been to very few places like this.
I have seen your video on youtube and that video is very good for a beginner
You haven't, I don't post video content.
You have included the link of this video in your post
That wasn't done by me, and is a tutorial for wanna-be new HIVE people.
You had a nice exploration but I just want you to be careful when trying your enter such abandoned places
Nice pictures!
There wasn't much graffiti so I guess some of them respect the place. I haven't had a tour of a lot of churches so seeing the inside of this one was very interesting. I am also amazed at how good the building is at capturing the natural light.
It's always a bonus. This is why I prefer blue-sky days. The year it's been perma-pissing down all summer, so there will be many grey sky posts appearing in around 1 year.
I would like to use the term graffiti-artists, but I simply cant - the guys spray painting in there were well below par. Atleast you managed to get in for a look before the wrecking ball pays it a visit !
Yes, just the local kids. You can tell when they are artists. I met one once, he he gave me a biz card!
Sad to see historical places get vandalized...
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Great exploration.
It's such a shame to see how disrespectful some people are to places like this. It's also a shame that your country isn't doing anything to renew and, eventually, repurpose buildings like this (but we have the exact same issue here in Italy... )
In this case, they are but it tends to take years for it to happen.