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Skaggs Island

On this page  the first photo is of an abandoned aircraft at Mare Island Naval Shipyard

 

The aircraft appears to be an F-80 “Shooting Star”, one of the first generation jet aircraft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-80_Shooting_Star

Today we went on a little trip, camera in hand to Skaggs Island. Originally, we planned to go there to see an abandoned base that my friend had been to before. He said it was pretty cool, and that there were confidential documents from the 60s still in filing cabinets. Why he didn't take them, I don't know. Our Skaggs Island trip didn't go as planned however. We first came there and the gate was closed. We squeezed past the gate and had a look at the filthy little booth just beyond the gate.
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Then we decided to leave, because out in the distance, we saw some people outside a white SUV. From the distance we were at, we couldn't tell if it was a police or sheriff SUV or what, so we decided to play it safe and come back another time, probably at night.
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So, unfortunately, we had to call it quits for Skaggs Island, but all was not lost. Just a few miles away, was Mare Island, CA.

Mare Island used to be a naval base. The place is huge. You would never know it was an island unless you saw the big bridge. There's about 2,000 abandoned buildings at this place. Almost all are locked, but we did what we could. We first came to this sort of dilapidated building. We couldn't get in, so I went up and took pictures as close as I could to the windows to see the inside.
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That second to last one with the cop, they circled around us a few times looking at us. I felt like a terrorist.
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We then came to an abandoned group of apartments, which I guess were housing for the people who worked on the island back when it was up and running. This place is just to your right as your coming to the island from the bridge.
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We found an unlocked storage closet on the second floor! Alas, empty.
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We walked by all the apartments when we saw a window that was partly open. We reached in and unlocked the door and made entry into one of the spartan, barren apartments.
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The apartment was connected to the next door apartment via a door in the bathroom. Having left the apartment complex, we drove around more until we reached a gigantic crane. And, being the idiots we were, we actually CLIMBED ALL THE WAY UP IT and went inside. Talk about a scary climb, too.
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We saw some people in a nearby parking lot staring at us climbing, so we decided to get down, and we saw a barge which was for carrying huge-ass ship parts, which were laying all around the place. Note the name of the ship. Then, we saw an electrified fence, and I was brutally electrocuted with 100,000 volts. Then I parked my luxurious '89 T-Bird under this thing. It looked like a car wash. But it clearly was not.
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Then we came to what I thought was the coolest, the drydocks (I'm pretty sure thats what they are) of Mare Island. The pictures really can't do them justice as to how huge and deep they are. I got vertigo looking down into them. I would love to have seen it in action, its an engineering marvel!
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So, finally we were done with Mare Island, and, determined to return to Skaggs Island at a later time, we drove home but not before stopping by the palacial campus of Solano Community College, to see the old fighter jet that was there. Don't ask me how it got there, or why it was there. However, someone please tell me what kind of plane it is. I'm not the wife beating military junkie-type.
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To contact Abandoned But Not Forgotten please e-mail us at abnfco@gmail.com with any questions or submissions you may want to contribute to the site.

I DON'T GIVE OUT LOCATIONS.  I DON'T KNOW IF THE BUILDINGS ARE FOR SALE.  I DON'T KNOW IF THE BUILDINGS ARE STILL STANDING.





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