Shawn Bags Miniatur Wunderland – Hamburg Germany - Trip Bagger

The last micro state I visited was Uzipis, which was quite the experience (link below). Here we go again with another interesting adventure, the smallest state on earth. https://www.tripbagger.com/2023/06/01/shawn-bags-the-independent-republik-of-uzupis/

How do I explain the worlds smallest state? Imagine, the most extensive model railroad set you have seen in your entire life. Of course, what model world would be complete without the building you are currently inside. This is exactly what Miniatur Wunderland looks like in real life, but tiny. Make sense, right?

Located in Hamburg Germany, modeled here Miniatur Wunderland consists of 12 themed worlds.

Picture of the same location in Hamburg I took while walking around as the mini-version. Just to give you something to compare real world vs Miniatur Wunderland.

Just the miniature Hamburg train station alone, has 2.6km of track, 550 switches and 200 trains.

The entire facility has a staggering 16km of model train track and 1231 trains that pull 12,000 rail cars. The longest train in the collection is 14m long.

It isn’t just trains. There are 11,800 cars and trucks too. Impossible to tell from the pictures, but the cars drive down the road as well, they are not stationary. When they reach an intersection, they even signal before making a turn. Each car has it’s own microprocessor on-board that is programmed to follow the rules of the road. The little cars have driven over 1,500,000km. The attention to detail is something only the Germans could do.

The miniatur Wunderland has cost 45 million euros to build, so far and has over 400 employees. This building model would periodically start on fire, smoke would come out the roof but the fire fighters would put it out.

It is fun to spot the famous landmarks, Vegas Baby! Miniatur Wonderland is also home to over half a million LED’s.

Which is pretty handy because every 15 minutes the mini sun goes down and the lights turn on for the night.

There are over 280,000 mini people at Miniatur Wunderland, some of which appear to be enjoying a concert.

But it isn’t just mini people at the Wunderland. Roughly 1.5 million real people visit per year. With over 25 million visitors total, so far. Plus 2 Shawns. This is downtown Hamburg complete with the elevator tunnel (more on that soon).

You could spend days, trying to spot all the hidden details. Like the man who has fallen into the snow on the roof.

Or the inside of this building. Are they filming…. a movie?

It shouldn’t surprise you that the gondolas in Switzerland would travel up and down the mountain.

Or that the center for world domination is located deep under the mountains of Switzerland. I always kind of assumed this.

But snow-white isn’t bothered by that at all.

Unlike these people out for a picnic, who are in for a little surprise.

There is even a guy getting hit by a car.

Italian coastline I believe.

With a stop in Venice.

Most displays had buttons you could press that would activate a feature, like the roller coaster would start.

Or the EDM festival would start when you pushed the button.

We just happened to visit mini Monaco in time for the F1 race. Where I could have sworn I saw a Porto-potty drive by on the track. I stood there for over 20minutes waiting for it to pass again so I could snap a picture but it never came back. Questioning my sanity, I found a video of it online to prove it really happens:
https://www.tiktok.com/@toniii1222/video/7485395855462370562

All of this craziness, including a Porto-potty racing in F1, is controlled from here.

Saving the best for last, in my opinion, the Knuffingen Airport.

This airport took 6 years to build with over 150,000 hours of time put into it. There is 100Km of wiring, 40,000 LED’s, 15,000 figurines and 90 cars that drive around the airport. All of this is controlled by 7 computers processing 50,000 lines of code.

Oh yeah, there are planes too, 52 of them that perform 250 flights per day.

And yes, the planes do take off, land and fly away. So if you ever happen to have gotten on a plane and find your self in Hamburg Germany, go check out the smallest micro state in the world. Side note: Yes, I forgot to take a summit selfie. This was on of those instances where you are just so engaged in everything there is to see, you can forget what is important in life… selfies.

Categories: Germany TravelTravel

Tags: GermanyTourismTourist AttractionTravel

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