Oktoberfest Munich

I am very much a beer aficionado.  I have brewed my own beer and cider for years.  Starting on the stovetop with a stockpot and a few buckets and finally getting to the point where I have a rather fancy electric setup where I can brew as much as 10 gallons of beer at a time.  Shortly after getting into beer I became infatuated with the traditional European brewing cultures.  Think countries like Belgium, Czechia and my absolute favorite…Germany.  I can find pleasure in drinking almost any style of beer, but the clean and quaffable lagers of Germany are something I will never grow tired of.  Dark, light, it doesn’t matter, I love them all.  And so if there is one celebration in the world that screams German beer, it’s got to be the one and only Oktoberfest in Munich!  For these reasons this has been a bucket list item for me for quite some time.  I’ve been to Munich in the past, but it was in the summer so I did not get to partake in this celebration.  So when the dates fell into place for this trip and it overlapped with Oktoberfest I HAD to make sure we got here so I at least got a taste.  It was the first thing I planned after booking the Queen Mary 2 and our ferry across the channel.

Since I was trying to integrate as many Hyatt’s into our itinerary as possible to take advantage of the top tier Globalist status I had earned last year I had booked the Andaz Munich Schwabinger Tor with points which is a Hyatt hotel in the northern part of the city.  It wasn’t cheap from a points perspective, 25,000 Hyatt points per night, but with the cash rate running close to 700 euro per night it was worth it.  It also isn’t the most convenient hotel to the festival because it requires a ride on the subway.  The walkable hotels were obscenely priced and for the most part not as nice from what I could tell.  I didn’t mind the extra commuting time.  We also had the advantage of being able to park for free because of my status which saves a fair bit of money in the city.  Lastly, I applied a suite upgrade certificate I had in my account to make our stay extra special.   No complaints about the hotel.  Parking is underground and safe and secure.  The hotel is nice and modern. Breakfast was really good (and once again free with my status).  The staff was wonderful as well, especially with Maverick.  

Some shots of our suite at the Andaz and the family enjoying the free happy hour after check-in.

I purposely avoided the weekend for our Oktoberfest visit simply to give us the best chance to be able to enjoy the festival.  If you are worried about it not being action packed enough on a weekday, don’t worry about it.  It’s plenty crazy on a weekday.  The Saturday before we arrived there were so many people they had to stop letting people in for a little while which was unprecedented.  Glad I avoided that!  We were there for a Monday and a Tuesday and that worked out great.

For our first day I decided to book a tour that included a guaranteed spot at a table in the Hofbrau tent.  The tour was expensive (over $400 for the two of us) but some of the cost was offset by the included beer and food.  I decided to book the tour because of my unfamiliarity with the festival.  I knew the tents could be hard to find space in and I wanted to make sure we got to spend some time in one of the more popular tents.  I booked the tour with Radius Tours and it was pretty good.  The group was large (over 90 people split between 3 guides) and you meet at the tour offices one subway stop away from the grounds.  They then take you around the grounds and tell you about the history of the festival and show you all the major tents and other sights.  After that you go inside the Hofbrau tent to a reserved area with its own dedicated wait staff.  The tour includes two 1 litre beers and a half chicken.  After you get to the tables it’s all drinking, eating and general merrymaking.  I’m not sure how long you can stay at the table, but it might be reserved the entire night.  The tour started early so we got into the tent around 12pm.  We did not stay into the evening because we had to get back to Maverick.

Waiting for the tour to start with our cookie necklaces that the tour guides used to keep track of us (left) and posing at the main entrance to the grounds (right)

I do not regret doing the tour, but with the right information I don’t think I would do it again.  It probably would be more worth it on a weekend than on a Monday.  If you get there early on a weekday there are plenty of seats in the tents.  The other downer is that it was 100% Americans and most of them seemed to be retirees from Florida. It definitely was not the crowd we were looking to drink with at Oktoberfest.  We were looking for a more international flavor.

Our first stein (top) and Amy giddy with excitement about her half chicken (bottom)

With the early start time and resulting early departure time our first day ended up being kind of an introduction to the festival.  We felt like we knew enough at this point to go back and do things properly.  It was time to get some rest and prepare our bodies for another round!

Inside and outside some of the main tents. It’s hard to believe these are all temporary structures that are disassembled and reassembled every year!

The strategy for day 2 was to start by visiting the “old Oktoberfest” which is an area of the festival that was added in 2010 to show an older, more traditional version of the festivities.  It is the only section that has an entry fee.  The fee was 4 euros when we visited.  This area tends to attract more children, older adults and people looking to experience Oktoberfest without the insanity and crowds that come with the main tents.  Inside the grounds there are some smaller rides and attractions geared to younger kids as well as a few mid-sized tents that serve beer and food just like the main tents.  The difference is that the drinkware is more traditional stoneware rather than glass and the entertainment is traditional music and dance instead of the international hits being belted out in the main tents.  

We ended up visiting all the tents in the old Oktoberfest.  In the early afternoon there were plenty of seats in all of them.  The beer and food are just as good and the bathrooms are much more manageable.  We saw music in some tents, dancing and singing in others.  We actually got to talk to some Bavarians rather than the international tourists that dominate the main tents.  Don’t ignore this part of the celebration, it’s worth the small entry fee!

Enjoying “Old” Oktoberfest

After leaving the old Oktoberfest we started making the rounds to the tents that we did not get to see inside of on our first day.  All of the tents are different and supposedly attract different crowds but it didn’t seem that way at all.  They are something to behold so try to make a point to see all of them.  At this point it was late afternoon and the things were starting to rock inside the tents.  Trying to find a spot inside was looking daunting so we decided to grab a beer and some more food at an outside table at the outdoor area of the Spaten tent.  The outside wasn’t too busy because the weather had been on and off rainy most of the day.  The staff outside was really nice and a couple of them actually sat at the table and chatted with us for a few minutes.

Some more of the excellent food we had, sausages and sauerkraut (left) and oxen (right)

Once we polished off our outside beers (our 3rd litres of the day) we were primed to take another crack at finding a spot inside.  We ended up in the Paulaner tent.  We could find no seats but posted up in the main aisle that goes around the entire tent.  As we were taking it all in, a waitress popped up out of nowhere and asked us if we wanted a beer.  Yes!  Steins in hand we spent a few minutes “talking” to a few Italians in their early 20s who were just “slightly” drunk.  Soon a table opened up near us and we were standing on the benches singing (err, maybe screaming?) Journey with a table full of Serbians and thousands of others.  What a BLAST!  I knew then that I already needed to go back again in the near future.

I really need to go back to Oktoberfest to get my fill.  I had to bake it into the itinerary for this trip because we were going to be on the continent while it was going on, but it wasn’t the best fit for a dog trip.  We couldn’t leave Mav for too long so on the first day we had to leave during the late afternoon just as things were starting to ramp up.  On the second day we stayed until the end but we arrived later which made it more difficult to find a spot in the larger tents.  It’s hard to fully dive into the festivities when you know you have to get back to the dog.  Plus we couldn’t help but feel a little guilty for leaving him alone so long.

One last Oktoberfest thought, don’t brush off the festival if you aren’t into beer or alcohol in general.  There is so much more to do beyond just drinking beer.  It is in essence a giant fair.  There are acres of serious rides and carnival games.  The food is actually amazing.  The half chicken we had in the Hofbrau tent might have been the best chicken I have ever had.  We also ate some oxen meat which was excellent.  This world famous festival has something for everyone.  

Lifting my final stein to the heavens. I can’t wait to go back!

Notes on the Autobahn

One thing I finally got to do in Germany was drive on the world famous German autobahn.  If you are unaware the German highways have no speed limits so it gets a lot of hype.  Our Peugeot is no performance car but during our longer drives I was cruising at 160 km/hr (100 mph).  Beyond that the car did not ride smooth enough for it to be enjoyable.  There were definitely cars going significantly faster than us, but they weren’t Peugeots!  

Driving this fast legally was great fun to try but the reality of the autobahn is much different than the vision people seem to have.  There is no speed limit, but that isn’t the case in tunnels, in cities, or in construction zones.  Pretty regularly you will hit zones that force you to drop your speed.  From talking to locals the best time for high speed driving is in rural areas late at night.

The other downside is that the faster you drive, the more fuel you burn.  There was a noticeable difference in fuel consumption when I was driving at 160 km/hr.  Combine that with the high fuel costs here ($7+ per gallon) you have a good recipe for burning a hole in your pocket.  I’m glad I tried the high speed driving and it would be even more fun with a better car but I wouldn’t do it regularly.

Next stop is the German Alps, hope to see you there!

One of the old school beer carts harkening back to the early days of the festival. No, Budweiser did not invent the horse drawn beer cart…