This is Plymouth --
IF THERE'S something stirring under your feet, it could well be Georgie Kirrin.
There is nothing mole-like about Georgie, and with her flaming pink hair and fine features you would not take her for a Troglodyte.
But underground is a passion for Georgie, one of the new breed of Urban Explorers – UrbExers in the jargon.
And of course Georgie is not her real name, because not everyone approves of her pastime, least of all the owners of the derelict places she explores.
Her photographs of Drake's Island were published in The Herald last month.
Georgie was inspired by the 1950s Enid Blyton series 'The Famous Five', featuring the tomboyish George Kirrin.
The Famous Five are a fictional group of children who have the sort of adventures most kids can only dream about… the sort of scrapes Plymouth's Georgie Kirrin seems determined to get herself into.
"I have always had quite a strong sense of adventure. I was a tomboy until the age of 12," she says over a tame cup of tea in a quiet back corner of a Plymouth café.
"When we moved to Plymouth when I was eight, we found an underground air raid shelter in our back garden and that was the most exciting moment of my life.
"About four years ago I was off sick for a day and was mooching around on a website called Derelict Places."
At the time the council had uncovered an air raid shelter in Devonport Park, but was about to bury it for good. She got in touch with a group and went along to the shelter for a last look.
She laughs in embarrassment at the idea of making contact with a strange man on the internet and then meeting up in a dark and abandoned tunnel.
"It does sound like a really stupid thing to do, but I really wanted to go!" she says, her face achieving the same hue as her vivid hair.
"Luckily I managed to convince a male friend to come with me, and since then I have tended to organise my own trips."
Before the Mount Wise development got under way she went on a tour of the air raid shelter and nuclear bunker under Admiralty House, one-time residence of the naval Commander in Chief Plymouth.
"It was like a set from a James Bond movie," she says. "The upper levels were full of cool comms, switches, maps, electrical stuff, engine stuff, massive wall maps.
"I couldn't resist pressing buttons and lowering my head to a microphone to bleat in mock Sixties voice: "Do you expect me to talk?""No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die!"
Another favourite is Cann Tunnel, which passes under Estover. The tunnel was built as part of the Plymouth and Dartmoor Railway, which was used to transport granite to Sutton Pool on horse-drawn wagons.
It was closed at the beginning of the 20th Century, and then converted into a shelter for up to 3,000 Dockyard workers in the Second World War.
"The liberty of exploring a place so unknown to most others – even those whose houses we were directly beneath – was overwhelming," she says.
"I am glad I visited when I did because it's like Fort Knox now.
Some UrbExers may be mere thrill-seekers, but not Georgie. Her website www.georgiekirrin.com marks her out as being on the intellectual end of the UrbEx spectrum, with a deep interest in the history of the places she explores.
Most people would be content to get their history neatly packaged from a museum.
"I feel, why should I only see those elements of history I have been told I can see, and which have been curated or presented in a particular way," Georgie says. "I want to see history unvarnished.
"We have so much history in Plymouth, but people have no idea. There are more than 100 fortifications around the city."
"There are a lot of people who say they would like to be Urbexers, but really can't be bothered, which is fine by me.
"The more accessible places are ruined by people." Even Cann Tunnel, which wasn't easy to get into, was stuffed with old shopping trolleys.
The Urbexers, by contrast, have their own code: Take nothing but photos and leave nothing but footprints.
She insists she is not as "gutsy" as some Urbexers are, but you would need to be a bit of an adrenalin junkie, all the same.
She achieved some public notoriety recently after exploring Drake's Island. (see The Herald, December 31, 2013)
It was, she says, "initially very exhilarating".
When she and a companion, "Andy", arrived on the island they were spooked by a siren going off, perhaps half expecting guards and dogs. It was just a foghorn.
She had another scary moment when she got stuck in a moat in Scraesdon fort.
"I climbed down a rope, but when I came to leave I realised I wasn't ten any more (she's 36) and I couldn't climb up."
But the deepest emotions come from her imagination.
"Air raid shelters are particularly poignant," she says. "There are times I've come out of them and sobbed. My imagination runs wild, maybe helped by the graffiti on the walls, the items like shoes left behind.
"UrbEx give explorers a sort of apocalypse feeling, what the world might look like with no people in it."
She is particularly intrigued by the mythical tunnels believed to lead to Drake's Island – from Mount Edgcumbe, the Hoe, even the Breakwater.
"I meet people who 'know' people who have been in the tunnels – but I never seem to meet the ones who actually have done it," she says.
Georgie is clearly a restless spirit. She spent her youth travelling and then did a creative writing degree in her thirties.
She says: "As a child I always wanted to do stuff boys did. I was a feminist at the age of six.
"If there's a locked door I want to know what's behind it."
And finally we get around to the truth, or a truth, anyway: "Exploring reminds me of being a child," she says. "I can be like a 10-year-old playing make-believe.
"Perhaps it's some kind of protest against getting older." Reported by This is 19 hours ago.
IF THERE'S something stirring under your feet, it could well be Georgie Kirrin.
There is nothing mole-like about Georgie, and with her flaming pink hair and fine features you would not take her for a Troglodyte.
But underground is a passion for Georgie, one of the new breed of Urban Explorers – UrbExers in the jargon.
And of course Georgie is not her real name, because not everyone approves of her pastime, least of all the owners of the derelict places she explores.
Her photographs of Drake's Island were published in The Herald last month.
Georgie was inspired by the 1950s Enid Blyton series 'The Famous Five', featuring the tomboyish George Kirrin.
The Famous Five are a fictional group of children who have the sort of adventures most kids can only dream about… the sort of scrapes Plymouth's Georgie Kirrin seems determined to get herself into.
"I have always had quite a strong sense of adventure. I was a tomboy until the age of 12," she says over a tame cup of tea in a quiet back corner of a Plymouth café.
"When we moved to Plymouth when I was eight, we found an underground air raid shelter in our back garden and that was the most exciting moment of my life.
"About four years ago I was off sick for a day and was mooching around on a website called Derelict Places."
At the time the council had uncovered an air raid shelter in Devonport Park, but was about to bury it for good. She got in touch with a group and went along to the shelter for a last look.
She laughs in embarrassment at the idea of making contact with a strange man on the internet and then meeting up in a dark and abandoned tunnel.
"It does sound like a really stupid thing to do, but I really wanted to go!" she says, her face achieving the same hue as her vivid hair.
"Luckily I managed to convince a male friend to come with me, and since then I have tended to organise my own trips."
Before the Mount Wise development got under way she went on a tour of the air raid shelter and nuclear bunker under Admiralty House, one-time residence of the naval Commander in Chief Plymouth.
"It was like a set from a James Bond movie," she says. "The upper levels were full of cool comms, switches, maps, electrical stuff, engine stuff, massive wall maps.
"I couldn't resist pressing buttons and lowering my head to a microphone to bleat in mock Sixties voice: "Do you expect me to talk?""No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die!"
Another favourite is Cann Tunnel, which passes under Estover. The tunnel was built as part of the Plymouth and Dartmoor Railway, which was used to transport granite to Sutton Pool on horse-drawn wagons.
It was closed at the beginning of the 20th Century, and then converted into a shelter for up to 3,000 Dockyard workers in the Second World War.
"The liberty of exploring a place so unknown to most others – even those whose houses we were directly beneath – was overwhelming," she says.
"I am glad I visited when I did because it's like Fort Knox now.
Some UrbExers may be mere thrill-seekers, but not Georgie. Her website www.georgiekirrin.com marks her out as being on the intellectual end of the UrbEx spectrum, with a deep interest in the history of the places she explores.
Most people would be content to get their history neatly packaged from a museum.
"I feel, why should I only see those elements of history I have been told I can see, and which have been curated or presented in a particular way," Georgie says. "I want to see history unvarnished.
"We have so much history in Plymouth, but people have no idea. There are more than 100 fortifications around the city."
"There are a lot of people who say they would like to be Urbexers, but really can't be bothered, which is fine by me.
"The more accessible places are ruined by people." Even Cann Tunnel, which wasn't easy to get into, was stuffed with old shopping trolleys.
The Urbexers, by contrast, have their own code: Take nothing but photos and leave nothing but footprints.
She insists she is not as "gutsy" as some Urbexers are, but you would need to be a bit of an adrenalin junkie, all the same.
She achieved some public notoriety recently after exploring Drake's Island. (see The Herald, December 31, 2013)
It was, she says, "initially very exhilarating".
When she and a companion, "Andy", arrived on the island they were spooked by a siren going off, perhaps half expecting guards and dogs. It was just a foghorn.
She had another scary moment when she got stuck in a moat in Scraesdon fort.
"I climbed down a rope, but when I came to leave I realised I wasn't ten any more (she's 36) and I couldn't climb up."
But the deepest emotions come from her imagination.
"Air raid shelters are particularly poignant," she says. "There are times I've come out of them and sobbed. My imagination runs wild, maybe helped by the graffiti on the walls, the items like shoes left behind.
"UrbEx give explorers a sort of apocalypse feeling, what the world might look like with no people in it."
She is particularly intrigued by the mythical tunnels believed to lead to Drake's Island – from Mount Edgcumbe, the Hoe, even the Breakwater.
"I meet people who 'know' people who have been in the tunnels – but I never seem to meet the ones who actually have done it," she says.
Georgie is clearly a restless spirit. She spent her youth travelling and then did a creative writing degree in her thirties.
She says: "As a child I always wanted to do stuff boys did. I was a feminist at the age of six.
"If there's a locked door I want to know what's behind it."
And finally we get around to the truth, or a truth, anyway: "Exploring reminds me of being a child," she says. "I can be like a 10-year-old playing make-believe.
"Perhaps it's some kind of protest against getting older." Reported by This is 19 hours ago.