Looking over at the many places I've visited this year, this one stood out to me from back in march when I took on one of the trickiest solo explores I've ever done. This telephone exchange sits within some of the last remaining office buildings of a huge oil facility in northern England that was mostly demolished after the company was acquired around the turn of the century. With reports of this place having all taken place last year and then falling quiet, this was a bit of a stab in the dark and upon arrival it seemed that its location smack-bang in the middle of one of the UK's biggest industrial districts had lead to it being secured at basically all access points. The flood of unwarranted visitors must have clearly prompted the land owners to properly seal the site, with 10ft high gates and cameras on each bridge over the brook running between me and the buildings. After walking across a handful of rubble-filled patches of land leading to nowhere, rather than turn around and call it a day I decided to figure out the route of the old pipeline, and used the marshland to slowly but surely find a way in with water up to my shins and soggy socks making it all the more interesting. Once I could see the buildings it was clear that whilst the site was derelict, it was still connected to the processing plant next door and staff used the old roadways for access and even lunch-breaks sat in their vans. I even saw one fella in an orange jumpsuit and hardhat taking a ride on his pushbike! One glance from these guys and it'd be game over. Long story short, I ended up shimmying along an industrial bridge on my stomach to avoid being seen, whilst duck-and-diving more than a few times along an embankment before finally two hours later making it inside the buildings. If this was in winter, I wouldn't have had much daylight left to take any photographs! But gladly I had time to dry my socks whilst photographing this charming old secluded place that's decayed nicely without interruption thanks to its placement far away from the eyes of the public. It felt like a real mission-impossible this one, and maybe that's what people would consider 'real' exploring, either way it definitely felt like an achievement that's for sure.