Germany's most eerie-but-beautiful lost places

Only ruins remain of banker Adolph von Hansemann's magnificent building on Rügen Island just off the Baltic Sea coast. Built from sandstone, granite and marble, the castle was one of the most expensive of its time. After World War II, a refugee and quarantine camp was located here until it was blown up in 1948 to make bricks. Since then, nature has started to reclaim the complex.

This complex played a role in the Nazis' mass murder of hundreds of thousands of disabled persons, physically or mentally ill children and adults for racist reasons. The Nazis used the site as a transit station before sending people to their deaths. The building has fallen into disrepair over the decades. Since 2010, however, there have been tours, concerts and theater performances here.

The Hohenschönhausen prison was a place of horror. Prisoners of East Germany’s secret police were forced to live in 60 windowless cells in the basement, each only equipped with a wooden cot and a bucket. Over 20,000 political prisoners were mentally and physically tortured here. Today it serves as a memorial center, and some of its tour guides were actually held as prisoners here.

From the east of Berlin to the west: On top of Teufelsberg hill is the US military’s former listening station with five radar domes. The hill itself was artificially created with rubble from World War II and is the second-highest spot in Berlin. The area is now used for cultural events and offers plenty of space for graffiti artists.

Hollywood stars George Clooney and Matt Damon have already visited this spot but not for health reasons. The site was a location for their movie "The Monuments Men." Since 2005 an association has been campaigning for the reconstruction of the sanatorium, which was founded in 1896 by the German Red Cross.

"Das Alpenhaus" is part of the 60-building group that formed a clinic for tuberculosis patients in Brandenburg. Burned out at the end of the World War II, a forest is now growing out of the ruins. Some of the other buildings have been refurbished and converted into apartments.

An approximately11 kilometer (6.8 miles) circular route leads through the former military site, which was created in 1910 as an imperial military training area. During the Nazi era, the German army used the huge bunkers. After 1945, the Soviets set up their high command here until they withdrew in 1994. Many people take part in bunker tours in Wünsdorf every year.

The coal and steel industry shaped the Ruhr region for over 150 years. Bit by bit, nature is reclaiming industrial sites such as the Hansa coking plant in Dortmund and the Zollverein colliery in Essen. Nevertheless, it is not quiet here: Exhibitions and guided tours bring these lost places to life.