Like kings, we rode today in first class seats to Germany’s largest port (and second largest city) Hamburg.
That’s the Rathaus (town hall) which is the most spectacular we’ve seen so far. It’s surrounded by shopping and adjacent to two large ‘lakes’ on which boats cruise and swans swim.
Although dozens of miles from the ocean, Hamburg is a major sea port and also features many canals…
And churches…
More about both of the tomorrow (hopefully)!
That’s a rare shot of the five of us together, taken using a handy mirror in our (lively) hotel. This was just prior to visiting a destination that is so popular it needs advance registration: Miniature Wonderland.
This is a place that has ultra detailed miniature dioramas on display, many of which include model train sets.
There’s dozens of themed displays on two levels, each of which features hundreds of buildings and vehicles and countless tiny people. Each of these are massive and it would take days to see everything there was to see in a given scene.
The attention to detail is astounding, and what makes it even more amazing is that virtually everything is hand created. There’s also a day/night schedule. The displays light up with thousands of LED and fiber optic lights when the sun goes down. Here’s a day/night example of a rock concert, which itself is only a portion of a much bigger display:
Miniature Wonderland is crazy in the best way, and certainly worth a visit if you’re in Hamburg.
Afterward we were all tired, but I had used my large nose to sniff out the existence of Germany’s largest fair, open in Hamburg right now. I had to go! So while B and Dad went to crash at the hotel, J, K and me headed to St Pauli (the red light district) and the giant fair called ‘The Dom’.
Now I’m super tired right now, so I’ll just say it was pretty amazing how large some of the (portable!) rides were.
And how complex some of the fun houses were.
And how many (pretty, flashing) lights there were.
And how much fun the Euro Coaster was to ride 🙂
We looked at everything and ate fair food and rode that one ride but eventually failed our saving throws against exhaustion and had to call it a day.
Tomorrow’s our only full day here. I’m looking forward to it 🙂