[Foist]

Wait, there's also a faux-Bavarian village in Georgia?? The article doesn't even acknowledge that they ripped off the idea from our little dorflich on the Wenatchee. And this raises the question -- just how many faux-bavarian villages are there in the U.S.?

[ale_capone]

Frankenmuth in Michigan is cool. Not as nice as Leavenworth, but feels more authentic. It was a settlement started by Germans from franconia. It wasnt originally meant to be a tourist destination. They just built things like they knew how. Best chicken dinner at the Bavarian inn, then watch the show on the glockenspiel.

[treeswarper]

Hmmm, this place still exists, although I think they added an extra consonant to their name. https://www.dersportsmann.com/ Just down the street used to be Der Junkyard. Fact.

[grannyhiker]

Lotsa fun with the fractured Deutsch, TS! It seems that everyone in WA with guests from Germany insists on taking them to Leavenworth, which is a severe test for the Germans on keeping a straight face. Well,maybe not everyone; some of us know better, or at least let our German friends know that this is for laughs!

[zimmertr]

Grew up in Michigan, cool to see someone talking about Frankenmuth. People just don't understand what I mean when I describe Bronners as the world's biggest Christmas store. My girlfriend's uncle works there. It feels authentic because it is! It's named after the Bavarian province Franconia where the original settlers are from.

[Leafguy]

Steve and I chatted with a thru hiker once on the pct. He was from Germany and mentioned he had taken a break from the trail and gone to Disneyland. We gave him a puzzled look to which he laughingly told us he had gone to Leavenworth. He was not impressed to say the least.

[treeswarper]

I have talked to Germans who said that Bavaria is considered to be a backwoodsish place. I got the impression that it is Bavariatucky in their minds. Der Junkyard was real. It was a typical walled in junkyard with a not up to standards, home made sign that said, Der Junkyard. The sign was a joke.

[ale_capone]

I grew up in detroit, and went to Bronners a lot as a kid. Grandma would take us once a year. Went back when I was older and it didn't seem nearly as huge as I remembered. Still pretty big though. I have a picture somewhere of my husky lifting his leg on the giant Santa. Dertown should have glockenspiel like the Bavarian inn, but use real humans. Charge tourists to be part of the show. 20$ to be one of the kids following the pied piper.