oktoberfest

A few weeks ago, I got a message from Shaun McDonough, a friend from back home, that he was going to be in Germany for Oktoberfest the weekend of September 29th. Some friends of mine in Zurich had talked about making the trip to Munich for Oktoberfest, but hadn't made a decision or done anything about it, so a group of us discussed it in Ireland and we booked an apartment in Munich for the weekend.

The group going consisted of: me, Alayna, Ianne, and Piotr from Zurich and Stephany and Anna would take the train from Amsterdam and meet us in Munich. Unfortunately at the last minute Anna was unable to make it.

We grabbed beer and snacks when we left work and headed to the train station Friday evening. The beer made the 4 hour train ride go quickly. We made friends with the German guy that sat next to us on the train and he confirmed that we really should "dress up" in dirndls and lederhosen. We arrived at the apartment around 11:30pm. The apartment was really nice and was just outside of the city center so it was quiet, but easily accessible - 5 minute walk to the train station and 5 stops to the main train station.

Saturday morning, Alayna, Piotr, and I woke up early and took the train to the city center for dirndl shopping!!! Since Stephany's birthday was Friday, we left her this surprise at the apartment for when she got in:

It was a successful shopping trip because we both found dirndls we loved and were able to wear them out of the store. We met up with Shaun at his hostel. He had bought lederhosen the previous day.

We then walked to Oktoberfest. It is quite the thing to see - a huge festival with lots of rides, lots of yummy-looking food, and TONS of people. We walked around for awhile trying to find the tent that had the shortest line, which was really non-existent. Most of the lines were for people that had reservations. We did not have reservations :(

We were getting pretty thirsty at this point and decided that if we ever wanted a beer we would have to just leave Oktoberfest and go to a bar nearby. As we walked away we walked past a line for a tent that was not long at all. We managed to shove ourselves to the front and I used 2 of the approximate 10 german words I know and the security guy gave us a promising look. Within 5 minutes, the four of us were inside and we celebrated like we'd won a competition - high fives all around and more importantly, beers all around!

We enjoyed hanging out in the beer garden and Ianne and Stephany showed up shortly after. We managed to get them in (the lines had only grown exponentially since we got in) by sweet talking and tipping our server. We ate pretzels and chicken (both of which were delicious), drank more beer, and made some friends.

After awhile, we decided we'd had enough and walked to a nearby bar/restaurant for more drinks and more food.

Unfortunately it had started raining when we left Oktoberfest, and we were freezing, so we changed back into our "normal" clothes for dinner. The rest of the night continued in the same manner - more drinks, more food, until we'd really had enough, and we headed back to the apartment.

Sunday morning, Stephany had to take an early train back to Amsterdam, and then Alayna and I woke up and went for a long walk around the neighborhood while the others slept in. The neighborhood was really cute, and we stopped in a little cafe for breakfast/tea. We took the special "Oktoberfest" train back to Zurich at 2:30pm. The normal trains were so full that they added an extra train. They must have brought out the oldest train cars around for this additional train. We nicknamed it the "puke train", not because of any unfortunate incidents from our group, but because we assumed they wanted to avoid ruining the nice trains on Oktoberfest-goers returning home.

All in all, a great time at Oktoberfest, but if you ever want to go I recommend the following:
1. go on a weekday, not a weekend
2. have reservations (which you need 6-12 months in advance)
3. get there 30 minutes - 1 hour (or earlier) before the tents open with your reservation in hand, and
4. you MUST dress up!