Leavenworth

One of the most distinctive towns in the Pacific Northwest, Leavenworth has a scant 2,000 residents but manages to attract more than a million visitors per year.

The attraction? A fanciful Bavarian village [1], complete with authentic architecture, hand-carved benches, and flower-bedecked streets, all backdropped by peaks of the Cascades. Add in the female clerks in Bavarian dirndl dresses and waiters in lederhosen, and the town gets a bit hokey at times, but it is certainly unique in America.

With almost 100 lodging places [2] and dozens of restaurants [3] and shops [4], it’s pretty clear that people love this place.

Getting to Leavenworth

Driving to Leavenworth in the winter over Stevens Pass [5] has been described as “driving through a Christmas card.” Rocky, snow-covered peaks surround the highway as you approach the 4,061-foot pass; closer to Leavenworth, the Wenatchee River rushes alongside the road through high, rocky walls. The trip from Seattle [6] is about 125 miles. From late fall to early spring, check out the Department of Transportation’s Mountain Pass Report (888/766-4636, www.wsdot.wa.gov/traffic/passes [7]) for up-to-date info. Have your chains ready! As an alternate route, take I-90 over Snoqualmie Pass [8] to Highway 97 north over Sauk Pass; these passes are generally drier and snow-free earlier than Stevens.

Inexpensive local Link (800/851-5465, www.linktransit.com [9]) buses connect Leavenworth with other parts of Chelan and Douglas Counties, including Lake Wenatchee, Cashmere [10], Wenatchee [11], and the popular tourist destinations of Lake Chelan [12] and the Mission Ridge Ski Area. Buses run Monday–Saturday and can carry bikes in the summer or skis in the winter.

Northwest Trailways (800/366-6975, www.northwesterntrailways.com [13]) stops in Leavenworth at the Park & Ride near Safeway, with service east to Spokane [14] and west to Everett [15].