Keeping Up With The Kerns: Oktoberfest

This was the second stop on our trip with Courtney, Keith and Kate (her husband Jay was sick and was unable to come!) We knew Oktoberfest would be crazy but we really were not sure what to expect exactly. We had SO much fun! Here is a breakdown of our Oktoberfest experience:

We arrived on Tuesday 9/30 and dedicated 2 full days to nothing but Oktoberfest. I have heard that the weekdays are more tame there and if that is true I cannot even imagine what a weekend there holds...we also learned we are getting old and cannot drink quite like we used to but we gave it a good effort and stayed until closing time both nights. ;) I apologize in advance that 90% of the photos below are either us drinking beers or smiling with beers in our hands- lets face it that was 90% of Oktoberfest!

When we first walked in the grounds of Oktoberfest I was a little confused because it reminded me of a state fair with just lots of rides, games and food tents. Then spread throughout were the beer tents; this is where Oktoberfest really came to life for me. It was like a whole different world inside each tent. There were 14 massive beer tents total the larger ones holding up to 8,500 people and we made our way into 6 of them. While each tent has it's own vibe they all provide the same basic overall experience, each had a huge live band in the center of the tent. The bands played everything from traditional German music (especially the typical cheers with your neighbors song, Ein Prosit, which is played about every 20 minutes) to top 40 songs- each tent we visited and their bands were amazing! I was also thoroughly impressed with the service at all the tents. With as many people that were there you recieved your food and beer within minutes everytime! It probably helped that at each tent only 5-8 food items and 1 type of beer were available and you could only pay in cash. Only the 6 beers brewed in Munich are offered during the festival and each tent picks 1 to serve which is only offered in 1 size (the size being huge-1 liter). Each beer was the equivalent of almost 3 regular beers. You have to be seated to order, at first finding a seat at all the long tables seemed impossible because at first glance there usually appears to be no free seating. But you typically just walk up to a less crowded table and ask to squeeze in so it was actually very easy and half a beer later you become best friends with the 10-20 people seated around you from all over the world and end up standing on the tables singing with them for hours. I was also so impressed with the waiters and especially waitresses carrying 10-12 huge beer steins at a time (I could barely hold 1)!

Magically enough there was never more than a 2 minute wait to use the bathroom and the bathrooms were so clean, literally I don't know how they do it. The Oktoberfest Gods have everything down to a science! My one regret is that we did not dress up in the traditional Oktoberfest garb- and pretty much everyone was dressed up (well probably 75%) if we are ever lucky enough to go back I will definitely have a costume ready! Here is a picture of the bathroom line with all the girls dressed up.

You have to be very careful about how much you drink at Oktoberfest as the huge beers can sneak up on you. Each beer is he equivalent of almost 3 beers. The girls never had more than 1 beer at each tent and after the second one I knew I had to be careful in order to last the whole day. We would rotate in water and make sure to pace ourselves. Here is a picture of a guy we saw at about 1:00 pm that did not pace himself.

We arrived very early Tuesday morning and headed strait there, our first stop was the Augustiner-Festhalle tent.

Our next stop was Hackner-Festzelt. I liked this tent a lot as they had painted murals all over all the walls.

The band in the center of it all

While trying to snap this picture of people of all ages dancing on tables and joining in on the fun I accidentally snapped the one below which I thought was hilarious!

Our third tent was Hofbrau Festzelt

The only english he could say was "you are very nice girl." :)

This is what the end of 3 beers looks like...

I think these are the only pictures I got from the fourth tent, Armbrustschutzenzt.

Late night snack...

Originally when we were headed into Oktoberfest at about 10:30 AM we made a goal to stay until at least 6:00 pm thinking we would not be able to make it. After all we had to catch a 5:00 am train from Prague to Munich so we thought making it until 6:00 would be an accomplishment. Little did we know how much fun we would be having, friends we would be making and beer we would be drinking- we stayed until the tents shut down at 11:00!

We sleept in on Wednesday and headed back for day 2 around noon.

Bratwurst!

Our first tent was Pshorr Braurosl

My new favorite German food, spaetzel!

Our next stop was he beer garden of Paulaner

Pretty view from the beer garden

Then we made our way from the beer garden to the actual Paulaner tent. This was the most fun tent we went to with the best music. Because of this we stayed here the longest until it closed at 11:00. But it also took us the longest to get a seat at one of the tables inside the tent. We actually had to go in shifts because asking people to make room for 5 people was a lot more difficult than asking for 2 people so Matt and I went in first and found one that had room for 2 then after we became friends with the table everyone else came to join us. This was a huge 4 hour dance party with friends from around the world and the most talked about part of our Oktoberfest adventure.

After our time at Oktoberfest I can certainly see what the hype was about and it definitely lived up to the party!

After our time in Munich we flew to Amsterdam to end our trip. We were there Thursday, October 2- Saturday, October 4. We had 2 nights and one full day there and we got to do a lot during that time.

Thursday night we had a Red Light District Tour with Mark, the best Dam Guide! Followed by a drink with the guide, burgers and a coffee shop stop.

Friday we went to the Anne Frank Museum, this was then first time we were actually able to get tickets and go inside. It was so eye opening to see how they actually lived for that long and hear the story again. It was an unforgettable experience!

Then walked around, shopped and explored Amsterdam.