How a vibrant, lively town in Germany turned ghostly, YouTuber’s visit to this place unravels the town’s past

Many cities get lost in time, forgotten by history and lose their identity. However, some places or towns become strangely mysterious, about whom many facts remain unsolved, questions about what happened there persist forever. One such strange place is JQH Rhinedalen in Germany, which is now completely consumed by forest. Vloggers in today’s time reach hidden and unknown places to unravel their mysteries or make their existence more popular by revealing them to the world. Similarly, a YouTuber recently visited the place and unraveled its exciting history, how it was in its hayday and how it ultimately vanished into the void.   

Rhinedalen’s history  

Rhinedalen is a town that was built in 1952 during the Cold War and housed at least 12,000 British soldiers and their families. Although it’s located in Germany, it mainly catered to British military and was a small British enclave. The country’s operations were closed in the town in 2013, and as of now it remains abandoned. The streets which were once roamed by armed soldiers with their rhythmic thud of boots, metals clinking resonated in the air, are now wandered by only wild animals like deer and red squirrels in its empty streets. 

YouTuber Colin Hodgson, also known as the ‘Bearded Explorer’, recently visited the deserted town to explore its mysteries and unravel its past. He calls Rheindalen as a ghost town, expressing his astonishment at the lost town by saying, “This place is so big, we could call it our own city.” He journaled his explorations of the town in a video, in which she showed its vastness and how it looks now in ruins and abandoned conditions.  

The settlement spans 376 hectares and it becomes almost invisible in summer when the dense canopy of trees shadows its many houses. However, Hodgson visited the town in winter, when the scarce leaves and plants parted, the ghostly outline of the town lay exposed. 

The German town was a vibrant and well-equipped town in its haydays which had a NAAFI superstore, a petrol station, two post offices, a textile shop, and even five primary schools. The houses were vast and had four bedrooms, along with attached garages. “Some garages haven’t been opened in a long time," Hodgson noted.