One probably has many summer memories. The reminiscence of going to the pool, hanging out with friends, going on road trips, and visiting amusement parks are among some of them. The thought of a visit to a park brings back excitement. There are the adrenaline-filled screams of passengers on roller coasters, the joyful laughter of children, the “oohs” and “ahhs” of kids experiencing the colorful land of wonder and imagination, and the distant, windy roar of roller coasters zooming down their slopes. The air smells of funnel cakes, cotton candy, and the green leaves of the trees thriving in the warm air. The sun’s warmth beats down on the parkgoers, drawing sweat from their happily tired bodies. They go on rides through man-made rivers in logs, tumbling down to small lakes and soaking themselves to cool down. The excitement of free falling keeps people seeking adventure until their feet throb from the long day’s journey of walking through the vibrant jungle of rides and crowds. They leave the park, go home, and anticipate the next time they will go back to the permanent carnival. The thought of never going back does not exist; decay is not an option.

Sadly, nothing lasts forever. Accidents happen, money does not come plentifully enough, people lose interest, places become forgotten. Why do the lives of these places end? What mysteries swirl about like ghosts behind the closed-off fences? As long as the world continues to change and accidents happen unexpectedly, theme parks die and their legacies eventually decay into the earth, becoming mysteries only for those adventurous enough to trespass behind the eerie, rusted gates.

All around the world, abandoned amusement parks decay, some with chilling histories and reasons for closing. The entire city of Prypiat in the Ukraine became wiped out when a reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded and left radioactive substances all over the area. Within that area, a small amusement park had been built, and was scheduled to open, but it never did because of the 1986 explosion (“Chernobyl Exclusion Zone”). The bumper cars, ferris wheel, and swings still sit in the abandoned city today, only seen by those brave enough to enter the eerie and contaminated area. In South Korea, the park Okpo Land was closed in 1999 due to a girl falling to her death when a ride malfunctioned (Hickman). People say that the duck-shaped car she fell out of had slipped off of the track, suspended in the air. Today, pictures show the exact one still hanging ominously from the decaying tracks, its eerie, bulging eyes looking scared as if it too is going to fall to its death. Japan’s Takakonuma Greenland Park is up there on the creepy level, with its eerie fog, forests, and rusting metal structures. Like Okpo Land, it too was closed because of accidental deaths. Open from 1973 to 1975, again in 1986 and then closing for good in 1999, it is not even on the maps anymore and information on it is scarce (Strusiewicz). “Takakonuma is located just a few dozen miles north from Fukushima, whose nuclear power plant had a spectacular meltdown [a few years ago] in the wake of the tsunami,” Strusiewicz says, showing that this Japanese amusement park is yet another creepy place that has been swallowed up by deadly radiation. These frightening and accidental deaths sometimes make it hard for those affected to find peace and move on.

For some closed parks, their past visitors still linger. In Lake Shawnee Amusement Park, “the park is still a playground for ghosts. The southern West Virginia park was abandoned in 1966 after the accidental deaths of two of its young patrons” (Kuruvilla). The victims’ stories are as follows:

“A little girl in a pink ruffled dress met her end after climbing into the circling swing set. She was killed after a truck backed into the path of the swing. Another little one, this time a boy, drowned in the amusement park’s swimming pool” (Kuruvilla).

The park may be closed, but the “new owner, Gaylord White, says he can hear the wooden swings creak, though it may not be the wind that pushes them...The younger White said he’s even seen the little girl, with her dress covered in blood” (Kuruvilla). The rusting swings and iron bars of memories still live on, some more “lively” than others.

These parks may be shut down, but they still receive visitors to gaze upon the ruins. One of the most mysterious to look at, Spreepark in Berlin, Germany, operated from 1969 to 2002 (Hickman). It closed because the owner could not afford to operate it anymore. Its gates are closed, but its swan boats, fallen dinosaur statues and rusted merry-go-rounds are some of the most photogenic, according to Mother Nature Network. Some parks have even been based off of popular stories, like Gulliver’s Kingdom, located in Japan. An enormous, and now graffiti-covered, sculpture of Lemuel Gulliver stretches 147.5 feet across the park grounds (Hickman).
“The park’s closing, the result of poor ticket sales, probably had something to do with its rather unfortunate locale...the park was adjacent to Japan’s infamous ‘Suicide Forest,’ and in the same village where the Aum Shinriyko doomsday cult was headquartered” (Hickman).
The huge sculpture lying underneath the mountains in the horizon is definitely a sight to behold, and it is no wonder that parks like these still get ambitious visitors carefully wandering down their cracked paths. Today, nature is taking back, wrapping its bright green vines and leaves around the splinters of wooden roller coasters and rusty suspended swings.

After all of these years, some structures still stand, and some are demolished. Many of these deserted places may never reopen, and a couple are even off of the map. The happy people, carnival music, and sweet-smelling air may be gone, but laughter of children still echoes through the crumbling chaos. For now, only adventure-seekers with a knack for ghostly sights will see behind those rusted gates and venture into the jungle of vines, peeling paint, and shattered wood among the battered buildings and cracking pathways. Only this time, the adrenaline will not be coming from the descent of a roller coaster, but from the thrill of seeing the captivating decadence.


Works Cited

Hickman, Matt. “8 Eerie Abandoned Amusement Parks.” Mother Nature Network. MNN Holdings, 2014. Web. 19 February 2014.

Kuruvilla, Carol. “Abandoned West Virginia Amusement Park has a Bloody History.” Daily News. Nydailynews.com, 2013. Web. 17 February 2014.


Strusiewicz, Cezary Jan. “The 7 Creepiest Places on Earth (Part 3).” Cracked. Demand Media, Inc., 2014. Web. 20 February 2014.