Munich, Germany and Oktoberfest - 09/23/13 - 09/29/13

On a lovely Monday 2 weeks ago, Darryl and I made our way over to the country of my "people," as my father is German. I'm not sure if you've noticed before, but my last name sounds pretty commanding/German and translates to "Count". I used to think this meant something like Count Dracula or The Count from Sesame Street, but it still impressively is a title of nobility.

Our first night in Munich was fairly low key as we were the first to arrive, and it was nice to have some alone time before the festivities began. Knowing our diets would consist of meat, bread and beer over the next 2 weeks, we found a Pakistani restaurant around the corner. The menu was in German only, though, and as my one year of German in college was subpar at most, we helplessly asked them to choose their favorite dishes. We are so glad we did - it was one of the best meals I have ever had!

Once most of the group of friends from around the world (shout out to Mikki for organizing this!) arrived the next day, we headed to the Hofbräuhaus brewery in central Munich. The hall boomed with chatter and a live band, interrupted multiple times for traditional song and dance, including 2 American songs which we would hear on repeat the entire trip: "Hey Baby" and "Country Roads". It was a little surreal seeing Germans in full on lederhosen/dirndl jumping up on tables, chugging large beers and singing in English on and off.

By the way, if you ever go to Oktoberfest and are wondering if you will be an outcast dressing up - don't worry about it! Almost everyone, especially the locals, is dressed up.

The next morning we went on a unique walking tour of Munich where the birthday boys (Brian and Dustin's 30th birthdays were both approaching) pulled a wagon with 2 kegs of beer. Our guide provided us with a historical perspective of the city while enforcing drinking games. There aren't laws against drinking in the streets and the other folks on 'normal' tours were extremely envious. Our tour guide, Lenny, drank as well - I think he may have come up with the most genius income generator of all time, if he doesn't die of a heart attack or liver failure before making his first million. 

After the street tour, we had a beer tent reservation at the actual Oktoberfest grounds. On our way, it almost started monsooning and we were all soaking wet by the time we made it into our (tiny for Oktoberfest) tent. I think my shoes are still drying out. Each tent ticket came with 2 liters of beer and a half a chicken - the most delicious chicken of my life! 

The fairgrounds are huge and have multiple beer tents, food and souvenir vendors and carnival rides. I ended up on an awesome roller coaster and swing ride with Darryl, which both provided a spectacular view of the lit up grounds at night.

Kenny and Kristin on the swings before take off

We went to bed pretty early after a day of fatty meats (seriously, so much meat...) and beer as we had another tent rented the next day. We wandered onto the grounds that morning and I was finally able to get a picture of the main entry because we were not trapped in a torrential downpour.

It was time for one of the BIG tents (Schottenhamel Spatenbrau) that holds around 10,000 people, and we spent the next 3.5 hours there eating another half chicken each (not as good this time) and drinking more beer. We had 2 tables upstairs with a view and it was the one of the most intense events I have ever experienced - about 10 times as large and loud as Hofbräuhaus: drunken Germans singing, roaring and dancing with a HUGE band in the middle playing all of the German (and again American) classics. 

View of the tent from our table

Brian and Ryan getting the party started

The first of many of Brian's amazing dance moves

After our time in the tent was up, we headed to another outdoor tent and split up into a few tables as our group was too large to accommodate. This is where one of the the true beauties of Oktoberfest lies - meeting people from all over the country and world, and I made a few friends from New Zealand/Australia/England, which made me even more excited about who I will run into in Thailand.

The next day, Saturday, was our last full day as a group so we decided to try to take another waking tour through Munich (self guided), since we didn't make it very far with Lenny's beer 'cruise'.  We ate some delicious bratwurst in the park and perused the local outdoor market, which was full of fresh produce, cheese, meat and various knickknacks.

One of my favorite spots after this was the Englischer Garten, which is a park larger than Central Park in NYC!

Not sure what is going on here, but it was fantastic

It was (compared to previous days) a fairly lazy one in anticipation of the main event of the evening, which was a medieval meat feast in a basement cellar of Feldherrnhalle. The street level of Ferdenhalle is where a confrontation between Hitler's followers (in an attempt to take over Bavaria) and the Bavarian Police escalated and resulted in the arrest of Hitler, which made for a peculiar location.

The cellar was filled with large tables and designed for big groups, and was catered to German tourists (always a good sign!). Most of the information was given in German first, then relayed specifically in English to our subset. You were only given a knife, cutting board and large napkin wrapped around your neck for eating and the intent was to use your hands for eating as much as possible. 

As it was Brian's official birthday, they took him in the back and dressed him up as a friar (fake beer gut and all) and he came out and threw water at the crowd, much to the displeasure of some of the other tourists. The food was ridiculously good and filling... if you ever go to Munich, it was highly entertaining!

We had a lot of hardcore Husky fans in our group, so the trip to Munich closed with a 1am viewing of the Husky vs. Arizona football game. I passed out pretty quickly in and we said most of our goodbyes then.

In closing, here are some fun facts about Oktoberfest in 2011 - seriously, how does someone lose an electric wheelchair?!?!:

• 6.9 million people drank 7.5 million litres of beer
• 48 children were lost
• 226,000 steins were recovered by security as people attempted to steal them from the tents
• Police attended 2175 incidents and made 487 arrests
• Lost property items included: live 8cm grasshopper, viking helmet, crutches, an electric wheelchair, 1300 items of clothing, 520 wallets, over 1000 ID cards, almost 500 mobile phones, 370 pairs of glasses, 90 cameras and 425 sets of keys - not forgetting a set of dentures (every year there is at least one set of dentures!).

Full set of photos can be found here.

-Erin