Karosta Prison sits in the North end of Liepaja, Latvia. When the hammer & sickle flag flew over Latvia, Karosta was a military compound housing over 40,000 military personnel. The prison it’s self was once a hospital and was used for mainly for Russian solders.
The actual prison is smaller than I thought.
Today it sits in the middle of the empty compound surrounded by overgrown brush and scores of abandoned buildings that Tsarist Russia built over 110 years ago. This really adds to loneliness of the compound. For more photos of the ghost town, go here. People actually still reside on the island among the decay and rot of it’s former glory.
A tour of the prison is sobering and costs 2.5 Lats ($5). A guard in an authentic soviet uniform will escort you around (in english) explain the history and scream at you if that is what you are into.
Written by Russian prisoner, says: I want to go home
As an added bonus, the tourist can spend the night here in an actual cell and guards will yell at you. Cost is about $15 per bed or $30 for the cell. Unfortunatley, there are no creature comforts here like wifi or freedom, so you must suck it up for the evening if you want to stay.
actual Karosta 'hostel' cell in stylish cerulean
Prison tour guide- he yells and everything in 3 languages
Bust of great leader Lenin and russian typewriter
Are you crazy!!! Staying in a soviet prison! They ship people off to the Gulag for free. That would be a nice visit. Any of the smoke drifting your way? Enjoy the trip as the first snow is in about a month!