By Sherry
Stripling
Seattle Times staff reporter
LEAVENWORTH, Chelan County — Golden leaves mark the end
of one season outside the Hotel Pension Anna as Janine
Salter takes a deep breath and begins her list of what's
next for festive Leavenworth.
The December Christmas lighting ceremonies will be
extended to three big weekends, she says, as if soft down
comforters and imported Bavarian furniture weren't enough
to tempt guests.
Three churches are doing live nativity scenes or other
performances.
And Thanksgiving! The Christkindlmarkt that kicks off
the gift-buying season (does it ever end in Leavenworth?)
may have 22 booths in the open-air market this weekend.
When snow falls in the rugged mountains that enclose
this Bavarian-themed town 125 miles from Seattle, tens of
thousands of people flock here for the comfort of a
storybook Christmas, heavy German food and shopkeepers who
live their trade seven days a week.
It all begins at 11 a.m. tomorrow when St. Nicolas — in
reality a retired Seattle police officer named David
Severance — blesses the merchants to open Christkindlmarkt.
Over the next three days, accordions and children
singing German Christmas songs will share the crisp air
with the smell of roasted chestnuts, spiced cider and
Bavarian baked goods.
Shoppers will wander among the craft and food booths and
the nearly 100 gift shops that anchor this little town in
the Cascade Mountains between Stevens Pass and Wenatchee.
Severance will attempt to wander with them when he
switches into Father Christmas in time for the children's
lantern parades at dusk tomorrow and Saturday, a role he'll
play through Christmas.
In reality, he never gets far.
"I just stand on Front Street and get my picture taken a
thousand times a day," said Severance who finds this task a
nice departure from his old life as a big-city cop.
"It's heaven. Everyone is happy, and the more packages
they have, the happier they seem."
Leavenworth has 600 hotel rooms. Many visitors spend
their days sledding, skiing, snowmobiling and sleigh
riding. They come to see "A Christmas Carol" or listen to
harpist Bronn Journey. But most of all, they shop.
The short daylight hours and the gift-giving season make
mincemeat out of credit cards along Leavenworth's Front and
Commercial streets where every second shop has cuckoo
clocks.
"I'm finding the best gifts," a woman told her husband
by cell phone at lunch one day this month at the popular
Visconti's at The Brewery. "So far I'm $60 in the hole, and
I'm going back for more."
Hummel figures. Sports clothes. Huckleberry products.
Signs that say "A grouchy German is a sauerkraut." Western
art. Jewelry. Imported food.
This year, there's an abundance of firefighter and
police figurines, as well as stores that cater to our
delusion that we all live in cabins.
"Why don't you get one of these birch candles," a woman
told her friend inside "A Country Heart." "I'm going to
have to get one simply because they smell so wonderful."
Since this former railroad and timber town sidetracked
extinction in the 1960s by embracing lederhosen,
Leavenworth has forced even McDonald's and Starbucks to add
kraut and yodel to the shape of their signs.
"Now I can go back and tell people I've been to
Germany," a Canadian woman said over a mound of
schweinshax'n at King Ludwig's Restaurant, which sells more
of the rotisseried broiled pork than anywhere west of
Chicago.
People make annual trips to Leavenworth for nutcrackers,
said Arlene Wagner, who displays more than 4,000 variations
dating back to the 1500s in Nutcracker Museum.
"It's a very, very busy time," Wagner said.
"It's funny because my whole family is in retail, and so
for Christmas Day we usually just have potluck and then
everyone takes a nap. We're exhausted."
Town packs overflow crowd
The Nutcracker Museum is
handicap accessible.