When I found myself in the south of USA one summer, memories of photos I saw of the abandoned Six Flags in New Orleans were conjured up.
I had really been getting into photography and I knew this was an opportunity not to be missed.
And it happened quickly.
After a sleepless night, I found myself walking through the expansive car park heading towards the towering rides and dilapidated buildings.
It was only 6 am, but already steaming hot. At the height of summer in New Orleans, there’s no relief from the sun.
The entrance looked particularly welcoming.
As I got closer to the theme park and stepped inside, I was smacked in the guts by an otherworldly feeling.
There was sh!t everywhere.
Not like human fecal matter, but just, like, y’know, stuff.
The winds of time have shifted them around (or a handful of fellow degenerates) until they finally found a resting place.
Apart from that ladder in the top right of the image that leads to a boarded up window?
Not a single pane of glass sat untouched.
Everything was smashed and there’s glass strewn across the concrete ground everywhere.
Every step I could hear the echoes of shards of glass scratching on the ground.
I motioned to buy my ticket before moving through the turnstile and making my way in.
Did I mention graffiti?
Everywhere.
Tags that said “this could have been beautiful” and “Dimitri from Brooklyn,” were there to greet me.
Well, greetings to you from Australia Dimitri.
The graffitied flowers a vast improvement on the absolute decrepit state of the former Six Flags amusement park.
Okay, so I lied, there were three panes of glass left untouched there and despite my best throwing attempts I couldn’t hit them.
Because something more pressing caught my attention…
…what appeared to be an upside down cross hanging on the wall of the building.
My heart rate started to pick up and I wondered if anyone was squatting around here.
Were they hostiles or friendlies?
It felt like I was being watched in there.
The problem was that with a lot of windows boarded up and no lights on, the windows spewed such a pitch black darkness.
I couldn’t see anything inside them.
And it’s only occuring to me now that I never even entered one of the buildings.
You don’t really blame me looking at that, do you?
I started to wonder – what were the things that happen behind those doors. Would the average man be capable of imagining them?
Unlikely.
And the name of one of my favorite bars cropped up, Employees Only.
Sadly, I didn’t stop in for a drink this time around.
But here’s a cheers to you Eric and Akiva.
Walls were completely bare naked, I had to divert my gaze to give them the appropriate respect – only after capturing this.
I spotted the confectionary section and having skipped breakfast I was ready for something to sample.
Sweet Adeline’s Confectionary fell through this time though (pun so very intended).
Far off I spotted the old ferris wheel and started tracking towards it.
The weight of shame making the ceiling fans droop down and point towards the ground. Most of them had been snapped or pulled off.
I tried to turn a few on, just to get a little relief from the heat.
No luck.
One of the only pieces of quality graffiti in the entire place. A big love heart with some names I can’t make out. Can you?
“Becaue I’m too cheap for roses,” written on the wall.
You may be a cheap delinquent, but you can’t top that romanticism!
A few cables ran down from the ceiling.
Even Jocco’s Mardi Gras Madness couldn’t entice me to enter the eternal abyss of undiluted darkness.
The Spongedude was one of the few signs that remained on the building, only a little bit of graffiti defacing it.
You could easily spend hours in there exploring the buildings and climbing the rides to get interesting camera angles.
I went by myself though, so I was edgier than a cliff and preferred to stay in the open where I couldn’t get into too much trouble.
How To Get Into The Abandoned Six Flags Amusement Park In New Orleans
I had been scouring as many forums and sites about how to get into the six flags amusement park in New Orleans as my feeble little mind would.
Plenty of the sites mentioned the fear and indeed the reality of getting busted for trespassing.
Really not an ideal result.
So I planned to hit Six Flags early – like before sunrise early.
I booked a cab for 5am, charged all my camera batteries and barely slept the night from the level of anticipation.
I could see the Six Flags park from the highway and as we turned off down another road, the main entrances all appeared blocked.
They were also in plain sight of the public eye.
So we kept driving around and found a residential area that actually brought me really close to a far corner of the car park.
The cab driver was an absolute legend and told me he’d wait while I ventured into the park.
Here’s where I went in:
You can drop a pin on Google maps to get the exact location to get into abandoned Six Flags.
Yeah, the scrub is as thick as Chewbacca’s fur coat. I’m pretty sure there’s some kind of poison ivy in there or something.
I brushed my arm against a bush and it flared up all red and sore.
Apparently, there are alligators around there too, and at least one in the pond in the center of the park – so be careful!
The address?
13507-13521 St Marie Dr, New Orleans, LA 70129, USA.
After I started playing around with Google Maps a bit and came across these equally bizarre images.
It was like the Google Earth mobile had actually been on the ground level in Six Flags New Orleans.
You could actually make out a Spongebob in the graphics!
How long it will stay like this no ones knows.
The New Orleans Economic Development Board had an offer on the property for $3.26M which met the appraised value of the site, but they shut this down.
So for now, the abandoned Six Flags amusement park in New Orleans remains one of the premiere havens for urbex explorers.
I’ve been photographing for 13 years and have a penchant for 35mm and medium format film. Black and white street photography is my go-to. My work has been featured in online and print media through a few publications like Shutterstock, Brooklyn Resource Mag, Off The Rails and Collective Quarterly.