Canadian World

I've been reading (and loving) the latest Paul Collins,  The Book of William: How Shakespeare's First Folio Conquered the World, and was intrigued by his mention of a Japanese tourist attraction called Canadian World.

I immediately went to google it and found an article from Canadian Business which contains the following intelligence:

A thousand kilometres north of Tokyo, along a lonely country highway cutting through blue foothills and red pine, stands a sign that makes locals cringe: "Welcome to Canadian World." Here, in the remote heart of volcanic, sparsely populated Hokkaido island, is a perfect reproduction of Prince Edward Island's 19th-century Green Gables homestead, right down to the bedpans. It should be an idyllic place, a celebration of Japan's unlikely yet enduring love affair with Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables novels. But the paint is peeling and the house is silent, surrounded by acres of weeds. Gone are the fields of lavender and the tourists who came to live out their fantasies from the Anne stories. Canadian World is a ghost town.

You can find a picture of the Hokkaido Green Gables here.

Oh, and you can browse the pages of a first folio here.