It was a chilly Friday evening in November 2014 and I was returning from a trip to the Chicago area. Temperatures in the daytime were in the 30s, which was a welcome change from the temperatures in the teens & 20s earlier in the week. The area I live in was hit hard with snow AND cold; I guess I was fortunate that the Chicago area was only brutally cold.
For the drive up on Sunday, I left at night, so I couldn't get any good photos of anything. Even if I wanted to try some nighttime shots, it was no use...central Indiana was being hit with snow and driving through it was such a nightmare all I wanted to do was get to my hotel and just be done driving.
So on my return trip home, I left the Chicago area around 1 PM. The sun was nice and bright and the 30-degree temperatures were like summer time compared to earlier in the week. I knew of a wind farm along I-65 in Indiana and I remember seeing it as I passed it on the way up, but dealing with the dark and the snow was more important to me than a bunch of windmills (or wind turbines, to be more PC). I know there's a group of people that absolutely HATE these things, but I'm of the group that loves seeing them.
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| view of the wind turbines from the I-65 SB rest area near Wolcott |
I pulled off in the rest area just outside of Wolcott. It's actually pretty well in the middle of nowhere, but Wolcott was the city shown on all of the informational sheets at the rest area. Yes, they're that big of a deal.
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| informational sheets at a rest area |
Armed with a free map from the rest area, I set off on a side jaunt to see them from the back roads, as opposed to zooming by them at 70 miles an hour.
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| US 231 south, just south of I-65 |
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| US 231 & Indiana state route 18 |
After photographing the some of the wind turbines and the cool older Econolite signals (retrofitted with LEDs) at the 231 & 18 junction, I COULD have hopped on 65 from route 18, BUT there was some more windmill action on the opposite side of the highway. Naturally, I had to continue on 18 to see more. That led me into Brookston, which wasn't much to write home about. My free map showed me that I could take Indiana 43 south back to the interstate, so I did just that. As I was coming up on the 43 and I-65 interchange outside of Lafayette (more accurately, Battle Ground), I noticed this:
I had already passed by the sign and was about to head onto the freeway, but my sense of adventure wasn't finished yet.
"Don't pass it. You'll regret it"
So I turned around. And boy was I glad I did.
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| the front of the hotel |
As I drove up the driveway, this is what I was greeted with. I love abandoned stuff; it's great to imagine the story behind these buildings...especially buildings (like hotels) that were once so full of life but are now reduced to silent boxes that most people drive on past without giving them a single thought. This particular hotel is barely visible from the road, as a person has to drive up a small hill and a long-ish driveway to reach it. Even on subsequent trips past this hotel, I've found it's hard to notice from the freeway.
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| the rear of the hotel |
The bottom two floors were boarded up to thwart vandalism and a fence was erected. Obviously that didn't help too much. I was hoping for an opening in the fence, but I didn't see one. I'm kinda glad though, because 1)I don't want to meet up with any vagrants, and 2)I don't need or want a criminal trespass charge. Plus after reading an article on the hotel, it is rife with mold, which I don't need to be breathing in.
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| another view of the front |
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| the hotel canopy, as taken through the fence |
The hotel opened in 1972 as a Days Inn. And it was a big deal back then, with a 12-page advertisement spread done up on the hotel. I can only imagine all the excitement leading up to the opening and being there for the grand opening. It would change owners a couple of times through the 80s and into the 90s, but the Holiday Inn name still stuck around until 2002. In 2001, Holiday Inn had put the hotel up for sale, as they opened a hotel six miles to the south of this one and were about to build another one in the Lafayette area. The hotel became a Days Inn in the spring of 2002 and in the fall, some inspection work being done revealed that the pool roof was unstable, so that area was closed.
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| the pool is off in the distance. To the right with MFK, I believe was the hotel's restaurant area |
By May 2003, the hotel's owners decided that it was time to throw in the towel. The property was foreclosed upon, but the rooms were left intact in the event someone else would re-open the hotel. Some of the furnishings and equipment were donated away, and then the property was secured (though I can only imagine how many times the fence had to be fixed).
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| the old hotel sign fronting the highway |
After I got home Friday night, I did a little research to see if I could find anything about it. The Lafayette Journal & Courier had a February 14, 2014 article on the hotel with its history and the fight the city is involved in regarding the structure. Most of my information came from that article, which can be viewed
here
Click on the links for more photos of the wind turbines and the hotel, hosted on my Flickr account:
Wolcott, IN Wind Farm
abandoned Days Inn, Lafayette, IN
