After squeezing through A small window to get inside of this cottage i was amazed at the amount of stuff left behind, it was like stepping back in time, was a proper time capsule RAW Footage in Scotland
I saw a video of a women who was still living in her family's cottage from her great grandfathers time. She kept it true to the time with not many if at all modern conveniences. She collected water from a stream. Had some animals and was living a 19th century life. It was fascinating to see how she was living a simple life there taking care of herself.
Proper slate roofing and mortared stone Our forefathers were not stupid nor cheap like sone of the awful construction methods I have seen in Spain n Portugal
There must be records of who lived there. It wasnt that long ago. I’d love to know why they just left all behind. Fingers crossed they won the lottery.
As fascinated I am by the images it leaves me with mixed feelings. I always imagine when seeing images like these that at one time it wasn't an abandoned cottage but a home to someone or a family. A place where conversations were had. Where people laughed, argued and did all the thing families do. The stuff, as it is called in the title, scattered around belonged to someone. Some of it probably had real meaning to a person now probably long gone. A home with stuff in it, but without live, is often enough a sad place. That's the feeling i'm left with to be honest.
And, it's an accurate feeling. It's almost a certainty that the people who left didnt really want to. They had to. We cant know why always, but you dont need to be a rocket scientist to know, a mishap, a tragedy, misfortune in some form befell these people. They got where they were going with their Asses, but not their stuff. Sad.
Was allowed access to a similar abandoned Scottish croft house in the late 90s, but much tidier inside. Owner emigrated to Canada in 1964. Old oil lamps, folded clothes, peat cutting tools, shepherd's crook. Most poignantly of all a large photo of the owner's brother in Seaforth Highlander's uniform, killed at the Battle of the Somme near High Wood in 1916. In a drawer was his death penny and medals. I went to the Somme and saw his name on the Thiepval memorial to the missing. Years later the house was sold and contents cleared.
Found a death penny in an Ayrshire farmhouse my sister bought 5 years ago Disgusting things ! Kill your men and gave your kids a life of poverty and a big fat penny to remind you of it !
@@bearwoodcraft3591 I don't know the answer to that, everything was left apparently in 1964. I was shown around the place by an elderly neighbour who had been left the key with instructions to look after the croft. I was given the details by him. The dead soldier's name was David Newlands and he had a brother called John who lost a leg in WW1. The neighbour faithfully carried out his instructions until his own death. I don't know who cleared the croft but I do hope it was a relative of the Newlands and the picture and medals are being treasured somewhere.
Sorry I was out when you called or I would have made you a cup of tea. Just because the house is a bit messy after I fired my cleaning lady, doesn't mean I don't live there. Thank you for finding my cat, I thought he just ran away. I highly recommend the SPC peaches in the box near the window which came all the way from the Shepparton Preserving Company (SPC) in Victoria Australia. Please lock the front door on your way out as I don't want any more RU-vidrs coming in to wreck the decor by cleaning up.
@@paristexas919 the person who lived here likely died. If that was their cat it probably hid when people came to take its owner away. Besides there were dead birds in the front room. The cat was probably a stray that lived there on its own after the place was abandoned and died from old age or disease.
You never know when you're leaving your house and never coming back. Make sure someone knows you're leaving your cat or dog alone to look for him in case something happens to you. Starving to death is one of the worst ways to die and should never happen to anyone.
Doesn't look as though the animal died of starvation. Most likely disease, injury or old age. This animal given the time period would have been able to exit the cottage.
There is a bit of a story to be gleaned here. House has been used for storage since it was occupied (all of the feed sacks) but the last occupant appears to have been an old man ( judging by the state of the kitchen & cooking utensils, most clothes downstairs are male, also a mobility type walking stick leaning against downstairs doorframe. Womans clothing mainly in bedroom with photos, guessing she passed away first and he ended up living downstairs probably too infirm to get upstairs easily. No tin bath in evidence at all, or nightstand so it appears that a man lived there for some time after a family or a woman. There is some fleece in the downstairs hall, suggesting that area involves shepherding, so perhaps that old man was a shepherd until the last. Im saying this because I have met several aged shepherds in the highlands who lived in situations very similar to that house, more camping in a single room than occupying the whole house. The cats probably went in there to die, cats do look for a secluded spot to expire and that house would have been open to them in the same way it was to the trespassers/filmmakers. Notice that there is no bathroom, toilet or any running water source, nor electricity, still quite common in rural scotland in the late 70s. As with most of rural scotland, that house would have been the property of the local landowner, and probably rented to the last occupant as part of his role in the lairds estate. Many landowners are happy to let tied cottages decay now because farming doesn’t produce enough income to rival the money that can be got from shooting/hunting, and tennants just get in the way. In the 80s I saw a whole village made unviable by the laird when he dug up the only road in & out of the place and evicted all the tenants. All because he was moving over to grouse shooting.
I feel sad for the old tenants. There's definitely a story here. Now I know why my kin left Scotland for America because of the landlords at the time. Beautiful countryside.
06:10 - So poignant. A clean cardigan hanging on the wall and a cane propped up nearby - this was someone's home until the day they fell ill and had to leave or passed. We come into the world naked and leave the same way. RIP dear soul.
I could never live there - too dark. I like walls of windows; this would depress me. I do love how old it is and the history that it would tell if it could talk.
@@mortimerbrewster3671 - My parents retired to a very old cottage like this in the dales. This place is only dark because the windows are covered and it's horrible inside. If you cleaned it up, painted the walls in a bright colour and had interior lighting it would be beautiful, especially with a big open fire. The views are absolutely beautiful to wake up and look out on a morning. My parents also added a conservatory and my mum would sit in it and read while my dad did the garden. I used to love to go for long walks with the dog when I visited and they grew lots of food. They make wonderful houses.
Looks like an easy resto. What people don't know is that in the 70s through the 90s and later, many Scottish landowners deliberately let cottages like this fall down rather than rent or sell them. They just didn't want people there.
Awe looks like someone was resourceful, until they got old and couldn't manage anymore, then gave up the ghost. May they rest in eternal peace in the life beyond .
You could almost imagine a little old man living there, sweater hung up, cane by the door, his socks hung to dry on the grate. He doesn't throw anything away because he's been through world wars and you never know what you might need. He thriftyily uses the free calendars he gets from the drug store. The latest ones are December 1973 and Jan 1972 so perhaps that's when he got sick or died and had to leave. The woman in the picture, maybe his daughter or his own wife from years ago with their baby.
I'm going through the same scenario as my 92yr old dad who lived on his own since my dear mom passed away in 1999 ,we did propose to him numerous time to let us build at our home a separate living section for him but he wanted his own independence, not that we could instruct or try to restrict him ,he was a "do all ex carpenter by trade " so also loved using odds n ends of wood to keep him busy through the years .We had him weekends ,public holidays away on trips ,anygiven day
Just found your channel, I'm in Scotland and recognised many things in there from my childhood. The orange wrapping over lucozade takes me back to pretending to be ill so I could stay off school and drink lucozade lol ..... I still drink it today. This gentleman left this earth in 1974 by the looks of things and I guess had no family. I wonder who he was, what sort of life he had, was it a happy home. Thank you for filming this, I absolute loved it and can't wait to watch more of your videos if they are like this. I bet there's some massive spiders living in there 😄
@@rangersasc To be fair the roof still looks in decent condition, which is the main problem with those sorts of cottages. There wasn't any evidence of major water ingress either. Would need a lot of work to get modern utilities put in though, unless you just wanted a very basic holiday cottage.
I know someone who did exactly that to what he thought abandoned Hse then few months later one of the inheriting member of the family turned up and things turned into nightmares and he ended up being evicted and lost all his savings which he used to restore the old cottage. He ended up in Manchester looking for a job at the age of 59. I put him up in my spare room until the Mrs gave me an ultimatum the he had to leave for hostel and I never heard of him since. He never got over his mistake. Sad. I used to hear him talking to himself in his room and I couldn't understand how he could live on 1 tin of baked beans a day everyday. Life can be a bitch.
Love the way you slowly move across personal belongings. To me that makes the video more interesting and shows a more personal glimpse into the lives of the people who lived there. Thanks for sharing!
Sad to see the old house in such disrepair. Makes you wonder how many children were born and brought up their and how their lives went. From the condition of the house coupled with the amount of tools lying about I’d guess some crofter who had grown old and suddenly died. Possibly no living relations, so the house was abandoned. Is the child in the photo of him with his mother or possibly his wife and child? I thought I saw what looked like a diary on the table, there may have some enlightening details in it. It makes you realise how mortal we are and how short a time we have on this earth. As a man in his mid 70s who has seen several people throughout their full life span it makes me wonder more than ever. I’ve known babies born, grow to adulthood, marry, have children, retire and eventually die. I hope all who lived in that house lived in contentment, surrounded by love.
Donald Paterson: yes so heartbreaking , so poignant to look at the reality of life and death, broke my heart To witness the carcass of the family cat who died with the cottage, if walls could speak ! Somewhere in my thoughts i had a memory of my own Grandmother, died a widow of age84yrs She had a beautiful brick house and gardens , she was Victorian , as she aged the house also Became neglected because of deaths in our family an immigrations abroad .makes me sad Mary Canada🇨🇦
Many of these abandoned houses have the same outcomes and finality. The appearance of elderly inhabitants, hoarding items, disarray, and overall disheveled appearance. They stopped up keeping their property till their end of days. Whether their families buried them or placed them in nursing homes may never be determined. Very sad as we watch these walkthroughs many decades later.
This gives a very real sense of connection to the past more than looking at pictures in a book. The stories behind each an every item and trying to find clues. Very poignant seeing such personal items like clothes and how well preserved the photographs were. Would be fascinating to speak to a local historian. I feel a sense of wonderment, admiration and respect for all those who once lived there. May they rest in peace.
I don't understand why everything is left out like that? It's like someone just threw a bunch of their belongings all over the place, left and never came back. I just don't get it.
@@jessehines4044 That's likely exactly what happened, or the clothes just lay where they fell over time. One day the person or people left and didn't come back for the cats. Hospital, perhaps.
They could have had physical/mental difficulties, maybe had a stroke,might not have bn able to say save my cats. So sad, whatever happened. The most pristine things were the photos, they should be saved, they could have had information on them, even if only the photographers address.
I think seeking out a local historian would be quite a good idea. There seemed to be the start of a conversation at the point the video ended, most likely left off out of respect. I suspect a tragedy of sorts occurred. Wider family often lived close together. We were three doors down from my grandmother into the early seventies the time which this place seems to have come to a virtual standstill.
sometimes there just isn't a single person with any information at all, but, sometimes you can see little hints as to who lived there and maybe a clue as to what made them just never return..it's at the individuals discretion whether they share all their findings or not..
@@juwylds7453 yes there was an opened postage box , the addressee name was probably on it, possibly the name of the owner who passed away. The explorer just broke in looked through stuff but didn't bother to provide much context past the date on calendars newspapers. This place is a shrine to someone's life that has passed.
I was surprised at the size of the home once you were inside. At one time, it was quite a nice home. It's as though some one just walked away and never returned 50 years ago.
That little door that lead to the fenced in part of the stairwell looked like it could have been used as some sort of playpen for small children. That's what I would have used it for. They're able to be seen and heard but still safe and can be left on their own.
Sad to think that was there parting gift to the world actually quite tragic 😔 all who live must sadly die 😢 I hope I could have a greater positive impact myself
@@libertygiveme1987 It’s the case of the animals who died in this cottage. For two cats to have died it’s most likely the owner died alone to. .If you don’t like animals you will always think different. I happen to rescue animals so my heart thinks different to the way your heart thinks. I’ve seen many of Alec’s video and one in particular was where he left a window open for a bird trapped in a cottage.That really touch me and that’s why I respect Alec.
This could have been a quaint cottage decades ago when it was cared for and lived in, but since abandoned for reasons unknown it has become derelict and totally rundown. What I found sad though is the fact that there are remnants that someone cared for pet cats, who have unfortunately since passed. I was also quite disturbed and upset upon seeing the personal photos, which perhaps should have been blurred out to preserve the people in the pictures. I'm sure that anyone involved or knows of that house would contact the family regarding what we've seen today
Right.. sometimes I feel some explorer should care a bit more, the house is still not very rotten inside as its door is sealed but I didn't like how he left it open.
I agree there-was a mark of disrespect in not sealing the door as they had found it. It hurts to think of the abandonment after death. So sad for the delerlic Cottage Oh I felt like I wanted ti use the coal to warm up the old homestead.
Lol, Alec, you move like a cat...agile as anything - that's quite the tiny window frame you squeezed through! Fantastic and really interesting explore, thanks for taking us along! Cheers🙂
Somebody has been through it before you. You can tell by the lids being off boxes drawers left open and stuff thrown everywhere. Don't think the owners left it like that
No I don't think so they usually like to vandalize the place and look for you know jewelry money as you can see they put two pieces of lumber in front of the doors so nobody would enter so the only way was through the window I think because the girl came in through a door and not through that tiny window.
This is what life is all about. We love things. Then we Work hard whole life to Accumulate them & one day leave everything behind to languish in silence. Great video , nice camera work with minute details. Thumbs up 👍👍 for ur hard work. Wish to see more like this in future.
While watching the entire video makes me realized how precious are those stuffs and hoping that this house will be preserve for the generations to come. And my childhood dreams was this I love doing this kind of adventure discovering the past life as a result of watching magical and mysterious movies.
I love the old abandoned cottage videos as much and if not more than the mansion ones. Probably because a lot of my people came from cottages. Great video!
@@______638 45 years ago means...these cottages hold personal family history, memories and belongings of people... like your folks', your grandparents' and great-grandparents' time. Just because it isnt pristine condition, doesnt mean "abandoned". Unless you get permission from whoever owns that property...and someone DOES own it...you DONT have rights to be rummagintg thru someone's inherited family home! The fact you have to bust a locked door, or look for a way to SNEEK in...and are staying alert, watching out if someone saw or heard you...TELLS me you never got permission and you KNOW you are being an unwanted intruder! Whose to say, when camera is off...that family letters, dishes, photos etc...are NOT being grabbed ...to sell or be displayed in the intruders' "collection"!
Thank You For Loving my comment. I used to explore With My Cousin Ariel...He and I Would Go With Friends and flashlights(Portable Lights)and a camcorder and explore old abandoned buildings. And old railways. It was So Fun and exiting and spooky yet very Special because we were revisiting places long forgotten by an older generation. We felt So Happy to archive these Adventures. They are A Part of my Life Experience I Respect and Remember fondly. May Good GOD Bless You.
This place is very old, many generations lived in this house. Despite the way it looks now, I can see it when it was clean and cared for, modest but loved. I can feel how warm that kitchen once was. What an amazing place ❤️
Old cottages such as this are precious time capsules… all I can think of is “ what have they seen? How many lives were lived within those walls?” All I can imagine, is what did this beautiful little cottage look like in its prime?! 🤔 I hope someone buys it and treats it with the love it deserves!
The Nissi Orphanage in Narok Kenya is looking for furniture and other things if you want to donate to this orphanage or other orphanages. Mercy Children's Center in Kisimu Kenya, and Uganda orphanages Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo, or Bungoma Kenya orphanages. Toba Tek Singh or Lahore Pakistan orphanages could use these things.
@@joygeorge3254 Are you kidding? I'm sure the places you mentioned could use many things, unfortunately. But have you ANY realistic idea how much it is to ship something nowadays? Much less bulky or heavy things INTERNATIONALLY? It's nothing short of astronomical, tbh. I wouldn't ship a paperback book to Kenya in this day & age; you could buy a case of books in a thrift store for what it would cost. 😔
@@janeyd5280 it's so sad right? But I don't think the cat was locked in. It could have gotten out via the window. Some sick cats like to go somewhere discreet to pass away. Perhaps this cat... knew the last owner.. and lay down there next to the bed in its final moments. :( :( :( how sad.
These little cottages are called Bothies in Scotland and Ireland . They look quaint now , but actually they were the family homes of quite large families . And were often difficult to live in. People do them up now and make nice dwellings of them. But there are many of these little Bothies in various states of repair in both Scotland and Ireland .
That's wrong. A "Bothy" is what you would call a shepherd's hut. We just call these old homes cottages in Scotland & Ireland. They are "vernacular" buildings dating from the late 1700s & 1800s, the one in the video is the simplest kind with fireplaces on the gable ends and low walls & very steep staircase, but there are ones with much higher walls and more room generally. They were very crudely built but actually quite clean & comfortable, especially in the summer. My cottage has hand-hewn logs as roof rafters for example.
So sad to see places like this fall into ruin. Reminds me of my own home place where I grew up. Mother left older brother in control of the place. He let everything rot down to a ruin, now lives in with brother inlaw and mooches off him. Wouldn't let any of us have anything, just let it rot so as to rub our noses in his authority over us. As to the poor cats, often times, after the owner passes, the cats are left to fend for themselves. If there is access to the outdoors and wild game (mice rabbits, etc) they can live for generations and still live on site. Seen it many times with old abandoned farmsteads. AS for me, I personally care for all the small cats that come by looking for a safe home, best friends that I can ever have! If cared for and kept safe from predators, I've had some live for 20 years.
That was a cool exploration! That house looked like it was built 500 years ago and going to be there for another 500 years. Thanks for getting into trouble for showing 😆
It's amazing in itself to find an old property like this that hasn't been renovated or developed into a holiday cottage. Looking at the way the last person left their possessions, and the old bottle of Lucozade, back in the day people only drank Lucozade when ill, not like today. I would guess someone who was ill went into hospital and expected to go back but never made it home.
Yes and maybe they didn’t have family who could afford to take the house and restore it...it takes $$$ to restore these abandoned houses...our house flooded in Hurricane Harvey several years back...it’s extremely expensive in US to repair and restoreahouse
Sad in a way but could be a museum of rural life and how people lived so simply through hard times, no gadgets to help. The resident must have been lonely and in bad health, unable to keep up with the place. Wouldn’t like to sweep it out as there must be some big old spiders in there, especially with the flies in the under stairs cupboard!
@@mariehillard1742 I understand that Marie, Lucozade today is sold in plastic bottles, in the past it came in a glass bottle which was covered in a cellophane type material, wrapped around the bottle and closed at the top.
What a beautiful cottage this would have been.So very sad😢It was once a home.I can see between the bits and bobs,I can visage someone sitting in the chair,beside the fire!Warming the kettle for a cuppa!I hope that someone will buy this,and bring it back to its former glory,and NOT demolish it.please..so much can be done here??I wish I had the money,I would buy it,and bring it back..All it needs is a lot of love..Is it still there now.This is Feb 2021.Thankyou.💓👍
This popped up as a recommendation. and im glad it did. Whatever happened to the people who lived there who knows, but just shows that no matter what possession s you may have in life, they stay behind when you go and sometimes nobody cares. sad but true fact of life. Make memories not possessions.
This paints a sad picture of an elderly man now too infirm to use the stairs, a bucket privy next to his sick bed downstairs where a bottle of lucozade still stands to give him his last ounce of energy, photographs of him as a baby with his mother and sibling on the mantelpiece but no pictures of his own children or wife, dying alone in a house he was probably born in and lived all his life. His brother perishing in Dunkirk and his mother passing in the early 60s surrounded by the camphor like smell of liniment in the top bedroom left him without family, alone to tick away his life on calendars still left on the walls as if to quantify his existence as nothing more than days, weeks, months and years, until the local undertakers stretchered him into the ambulance and then on to the nearest town with a mortuary in 1974, remembered and missed by none but his two cats.
That Lucozade bottle was from the days when you only drank it if you were quite ill. Now, it is has become an everyday drink for energy which is really not a good idea to fill yourself up with glucose unless you want to give your pancreas a never-ending challenge.
Its like a different era in various parts of this cottage. Would be interesting to find when it was built. I live in America so I don't think we ever had cottages like this. The front door looks like pre 1800s or earlier than the 1600s. Hard to say because I don't know how and when homes/cottages evolved in Scotland.
Wow amazing.I thought you had gotten stuck in the window opening for a minute.The opening was tiny.Beautiful cottage with amazing views.Your brave to go looking.xx
The cooking range in the kitchen takes me back to when I was a wee laddie. I remember the kettle boiling and my mum making pancakes on a girdle suspended over the fire. The kist in the upstairs room (storage chest to you townies) is a throwback to earlier times when farm workers, who stayed in the bothy on a farm, would store all their belongings in their kist and when they moved on to anither fee they'd pack their kist and leave.
I often see a number of Scottish words that seem derived from Norwegian, 'Kist' is common to German, Norwegian and Welsh (albeit a slightly different spelling) meaning, box, coffin or chest. Must have been great to grow up in one of these old farms when they were actively working. It seems a lot of such buildings fall into a state of neglect - this is part of our heritage and should be protected. Beautiful location.
What a wonderful find but sad as well.Everything left behind,the old photos as well.Love looking at these old derelict places,makes you wonder about the people who lived there over the years and years.How lovely it would be to have the money to buy this place and restore it to its original glory. Lovely peaceful place to live.Just sad to see all the abandoned things.Thank you for sharing.👍👍
@@ExploringwithAlec Thanks for preserving a bit of history for us, also much compassion for the departed occupants which they others wise would not have.
THAT is a documentary! I just moved into a cottage in the Highlands, must not have been too far from this, since not far from Dingwall, but the barn! The barn was FULL of exactly the same stuff!!! Anyway, thanks for posting! I wish there was some way of preserving all this for historical purposes, but most of it just needs to go to the rubbish heap!
Found a house like this on Dartmoor during my outward bound solo hike. Everything was cleaner and tidier than this place. The houses are dotted across the moor and only used when rounding up ponies, there was a 14 year old newspaper spread out on the kitchen table like someone had been reading it that day. Spent a night there, better than a bivvi but a little “haunted” vibe about it.
I can picture it was an old lady's house and that she died alone...the place looks mostly untouched for decades poor cat might have died of hypothermia
We did, be warned it's really expensive even if you do lots of the hard donkey work yourself. If you live in England and the building is listed like ours you have to deal with Historic England, the most useless people this side of the government.
Yes. I was watching this and thinking what a sweet little cottage, and what would it take to make a nice little home from it. That old cooker looks restorable, and the roof is in good shape. There is no water damage inside. 99% is just clean up.
@@ianinnes8063 Most Urbexers break and enter. A lot of them steal stuff and bust up crap inside too. Even if it's a more responsible group like the New wave Urbex smash genre explorers.
@@chelin7023 Ireland is full of houses like this .My family left a huge House before going to the Americas . The laws in England can be very different from those of the Celtic lands especially the rural one .
So many memories. So much guts & Gail sacrifice & tough character to live in a house like this. Where is this place ??? Thanks for this the lady was beautiful x
Watching Alec is the closest ill ever get to Scotland. I'm a 2nd generation Scot-irish female. The topography of the British isles is beyond stunning. K
