Some of you know that I visited Miniature Wunderland in Hamburg this week.
What was it like...... all I can say is wow :O :O :O I have never seen anything like this.
Miniature Wunderland is in an old warehouse on the dockside in Hamburg (lovely City by the way). It is advertised as a miniature railway in Ho gauge (1/84), but it is so much more than that. I will let my pics and vids do the talking as I think they will say much more than I ever could.
I did find a couple of tanks
These were part of a diorama, that itself is part of a series of dioramas show 5000 years of German history. This is all before you get to the model proper. There are also displays of how miniature wonderland has been developed.
So on to the actual model experience.
This is the first thing you see the you enter the miniature wonderland.
The people on the balcony in the middle of the pic will give an idea of the scale. This is the Swiss Alps. every twenty minutes daytime turns to night through the whole layout and all the lights come on.
and from above
The details are amazing. This is a festival
Little details everywhere too many to tell about, but here are a few.
a bank robbery
I hope the vet washes his hand after this
some people enjoying the sun as nature intended, check out the guy in the reeds!
The carwash works
This is Knuffingen a fictional town somewhere in Germany.
Lots of the vehicles move autonomously. They know when their battery needs charging, and drive themselves off the layout to a charging bay where they recharge, and then return themselves to the layout. all this is automatic no human hands needed.
Every once in a while a fire breaks out. Sometimes at a house in the town, or at the chateaux on the the hill or perhaps in a lorry.
When this happens the emergency services race to the scene, again this is all autonomous.
The layout just goes on and on
There is a section for Hamburg which has its own funfair
with a working rollercoaster
The layout was started in 2000 and currently covers Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Scandinavia, and the US. Italy is currently being built and there are plans for other countries too. So what does it take to control all this?
But the undoubted star of the show is the Knuffingen Airport. This is a fully working 1/84 scale airport. The planes land taxi and take off, vehicles service them, steps move in and out of place for passengers to board, while coaches drive to pick them up or drop them off. It is amazing.
The cargo terminal
The passenger terminal
The screens you can see the backs of above the airport are arrival and departure boards which are showing details of actual arrivals and departures.
The runway
The car parks and terminal buildings
The aircraft take of and land by day and night
Planes Taxi to and from the runway
The emergency services have things to deal with at the airport too
and maybe the only place you can still see Concord take off and land.
Seriously guys this place is amazing, and if you ever get the opportunity to visit it don't turn it down. 8) 8) 8) 8)
