Everything you needed to know about Oktoberfest and more

I am going to hand over to Sparky, our guest blogger for this week, as he recounts our adventures in Munich...

Grab a cup of tea, coffee, beer, wine and some snacks because this one is going to be a long one.

I should introduce the travellers at this point. There was me, Matt, Ang and then Scottish Stu (I went to his parents for Easter this year), Amanda/Mandy (she has featured in a few travels including Sweden and Croatia) and Angela who was Amanda's friend who has recently arrived in London. These two were also the two who weren't beer drinkers and heading to the world's biggest beer festival! Oh and of course Sven my trusty shark. We had a slightly confusing time getting our tickets as you had to do it at the checkin machines, thankfully a guy who worked for Lufthansa did it for us. We had a quick snack before the flight and then got on our plane. Now it's not often I fly with full service airlines, you know the ones that actually give you food and drinks for free. I was sure we would get some sort of decent meal for our 2 hour flight to Germany. Unfortunately all we got was a seeded bun with very yellow cheese, one lettuce leaf and a whole lot of butter. Not much chop if you ask me. I really wanted to have a beer but it was about 6:30am so thought it was too early. Some other guy on the flight didn't think so though, no it wasn't Matt.

We arrived in rainy Munich, had a very confusing time getting our tickets (I subsequently realised I have pretty much lost all the German I learnt at University). Finally worked out how to get our tickets and set off to our self contained apartments. We got off at Ostbahnhof got into a cab and then headed to our flat in Bogenhausen (funny name hey). We met the owners of the flat who were called Roberto and Saviola, they shook everyones hands and I can safetly say both of them (especially Saviola) had very burly handshakes. We unpacked, settled in and got a rundown on the public transport from Roberto. We walked to the metro (aka Munich U-bahn) and caught our train to the city. We got off at the Odeanplatz stop - which was at the top of the main street. We walked down the main drag and headed towards the main square called Marienplatz. It was here we decided to pull up for some food and Matt and Ang decided to have their first stiens. After lunch and listening to some dodgy band playing in the square we walked through the local food market which had freaking awesome food. You could buy a bag of crackling to snack on! Unfortunately we never made it back there :( We then had to wander around the city in an attempt to find an internet cafe to print off tickets we needed for the tour we were doing the next day and a currency exchange. Afterwards we all went back to the flat for an early night in preparation for our trip to the castle. For dinner Stu managed to find some pizza place that delivered. Well done considering none of us could speak German very well.

The next day we got up early and headed in the main train station to go on our cultural day trip to Neuschwanstein Castle. We met our tour guide Roland who was an English fella and amused us all day with his story telling antics. Basically he would raise his voice, add lots of different inflections and lean forward while holding his hands behind his back getting very excited during the story. We all meanwhile stood around bored and thinking he was a bit queer. Anyway the trip out there was quite interesting in that we were all told to get on a train and simply find a seat and then in a couple of stops we would need to change trains to get to the castle. The first train was great in that we managed to find a six seater booth where we all sat and chatted until we got to the station change. The next train wasn't so nice and we all manged to cram onto it and had little naps before we arrived. On the way there the weather fined up and we got our first glimpse of the castle which I can safetly say shits all over the castle i have seen so far. Before we started the trip we had time for a quick feed of sausage, a drink and then we started the trek.

We walked past the first castle which was built by King Ludwig's father - Hohenschwangau Castle. It's quite nice as well and looks over a massive lake which looked so nice we all wanted to go swimming and surprisingly it was warm too. After a look around we started the walk up to the castle. Matt, Ang, Stu and I walked up there while the girls took the bus. The walk up was a pretty hard slog but well worth it to see the forest all around the castle. Halfway up there is a bridge that goes across the gorge and you get a fantatic view of the castle. You can see it in the Neuschwanstein Castle link above. After this we had another easy climb to get to the castle. We got a tour through the castle which was simly amazing.

The story behind it is the King Ludwig was a little kooky and basically loved Richard Wagner who was a song/opera composer. If you want to find out more you can check it out here. He comissioned the castle and most of the rooms are designed to reflect different operas Wagner wrote. Ludwig never married and it is thought he was gay. Our guide told us he used to play hide and seek with his staff and also have huge parties where everyone would get drunk and then get naked. Sounds like a great time to me :) After the trip through the castle, which was massive, we got to walk back down to the village through the gorge. We arrived back at the village, had enough time for another sausage and then got onto the bus to take us to the train station to get back to Munich. Our tour guide managed to get into a fight with some other Australian tour guide who turned out to be such a complete bogan that I ended up telling the people around us he should just punch her in the head to shut her up. They all agreed which was good :)

Our trip back was a complete mission in that we had to catch three trains to get there which included a 30 minute break at one station. It was during this break we manged to get some petzels and beers to continue our journey. Our tour guide told us of a great place to go and have dinner and drinks at in Munich when we got back and we somehow managed to remember his directions and how to get there. We caught a tram a couple of stops down from the main train station and got off at what looked like a very dodgy part of town. There was pub that looked like a complete dive and a sex store on the street. We spied a bigger looking pub with people standing outside and thought we would try it out. We wandered in and found it was absolutely huge and the correct pub!! It was a massive beer hall full to the brim with people eating, drinking and yelling PROST! Which is German for Cheers. We went to the bar and all ordered some drinks and even saw the guys tap a keg. The beer is in a huge barrel and two guys lifted it up onto the bench where one guy then got a tap (yes a tap) and hammered it into the barrel. They pour the beer into the steins using what looks like a normal hose tap. Very weird. We then found a table upstairs to have a meal at and were pleasantly surprised at how cheap it all was. Everyone pretty much ordered massive meat based dishes with very little vegetables. Ok it had sauerkraut and potato dumplings but really this wasn't that healthy. I order the pork knuckle which I can safely say was freaking delicious. When the bill arrived we were all pleasantly surprised as it was only $70 Euro which is amazing considering there were 6 of us and we all had drinks and a meal. In London this would have easliy topped £180. We all headed home in cabs after dinner as we knew the real shenanigans were going to start the next day!!

Next day we were up and out of the flats heading to the Oktoberfest site, which is at Theresienwiese which is right near the city centre. Now I have dubbed Oktoberfest Disneyland for Drunks!! There is a whole array of food, showrides, carny games and general drunken antics. On our arrival we were amazed at the amount of people who got dressed up in the traditional clothes of Lederhosen. It's been decided we are all going to get the traditional dress next year. So first thing we did when we arrived was obviously get some pork hotdogs and schnitzel. Then we attacked the rides, there were so many rollercoasters and carny rides that we were all very excited! We continued to walk around the site and marvel at the size of the tents. These tents are the size of airplane hangers and can hold between 10,000 - 17,000 people. We wanted a quick rest so we found one of the outdoor tents and had a sit down and a drink. I had a coke which I'm still quite shocked about!

I had organised for us to be in a tent at the festival however we had to go to a pub to collect the tickets so at around 3pm we all headed off to the Lowenbrau pub to get the tickets. Thankfully it was only two stops away on the U-bahn. We found the pub and when we arrived were greeted with what I can only describe as a simply breathtaking sight. Yes there was a whole cow on a rotisserie in a window at the entrance to the pub. We all stood there drooling and marvelling at this glorious sight and then entered the pub to collect the tickets. Now this is where I found out that what I thought was a booking for a tent was actually a booking for a table in the beer hall at this particular pub. Now to be fair on their website they did say that the tickets were for their tent and they even called the beer hall their tent. When I said I thought I was buying tickets to the tent at the site they simply looked at me and said this is our tent. I went downstairs to tell the crew the bad news but we all decided to make the most of it and have a good time. And have a good time we certainly bloody did!! First off we were there at 4pm and weren't allowed into the beer hall until 6:30pm so we thought we'd have a cheeky drink. We found a table outside and waited for service. In Munich it is all table service, you don't go to the bar at all. Unfortunately our table seemd to be located in the Bermuda triangle as the hostesses would look at us and then look away....after a while we went to the bar to get drinks and were told to get it at the table. After some jumbled German and pointing they finally gave us our drinks. We had some beer/wine discussed the rotating cow, beer, how much beer we thought we would consume and of course our favourite topic - toilet humour. Stu and Angela didn't find this funny but Ang, Matt, Amanda and I were having a great time.

Now the time had arrived for use to venture into the beer hall. Upon entry we were greated with another beautiful sight. Tables upon tables across the floor, oompah band setup and our gracious waiter Max. A true Bavarian who I think thought we were all very polite and nice people, if only he knew how the night would end up... So we estimated the whole beer hall would have held close to 10,000 people which was unfathomable! But we decided to get down to business and order our beers. Even Mandy and Angela had some beers, ok Amanda had a half beer and half lemonade but she did really well. During our first beer Angela was smashing us and drinking like a true beer connissuer. Ang was very encouraging of our poor little Amanda, who wasn't really enjoying her shandy, she was giving her constant praise including - well done, you're doing so well. All very amusing. After another stein we decided to get some food into us and asked Max to bring us 4 of his finest dishes. These were pork knuckle, oxen (from the cow out the front), roast and another one that I can't remember. I'd had a few by this stage. So all of us eating was like being at one of those medievel banquets. Forks, knives and food flying everywhere. Must had been funny to watch. After dinner we all consumed more beer and the girls moved onto wine. Angela decided it would be fun for us all to have shots so we ordered a round of Jagermeister and Amanda got some sort of god awful Schnapps.

The band had started at this point and people were starting to get up on the seats and sing and dance. Of course I needed absolutetly no encouragement and got right on up there with them even singing along with them. Well I just kind of made German sounding noises to most of the songs as the lyrics were in German. Mind you they did sing quite a lot of English songs including a surpring amount of Oliva Newton John?? The main song they sang during the night was a drinking song sung everywhere during the Oktoberfest called Ein Prosit - check out this YouTube for the song they sing (towards the end). So as you can imagine I was getting right into this. I swear they sang it every bloody 15-30 minutes and as soon as I heard it I was up singing. They also loved playing and singing the song - Is this the way to Amarillo - It is sung by a German band as well and they all go off when it is played. This became another one of our theme songs for the trip with us all breaking into song whenever someone would hum it or sing it.

Now I should also point out that during the night I was telling everyone everytime they cheersed we could smash the steins as hard as we wanted because they don't break. We (well mainly me) were all getting rowdy and smashing steins with beer jumping out of them about 20cm into the air. I think you all see where this is heading. As I was cheering some random guy who was standing on the chairs with us and I promptly smashed both our steins. I of course blamed it on him and made him buy me a new beer, cheeky aren't I. The rest of the night got suitably rowdy with us all singing, Angela getting random men to our table and them all fighting for her attention, Ang talking to the locals telling them she was a tradie and showing off her tattoos. Stu even managed to pull some random Aussie guy! Amanda managed to get talking to a guy from Denmark who looked exactly like Charlie Sheen, so much so that guys were coming up to him and telling him how much they like his movies.

Angela and Amanda decided they wanted to go home around this point so Stu, Matt, Ang and I decided to head up the front to dance, sing and drink more beer. We were standing on the chairs, yellling and singing along to ACDC and any other song they played. Matt has video recorded some of it and you can check them out on his YouTube site (they might not be up there yet but he is putting them up there). They are quite amusing and show you exactly how we were all behaving. During out chair dancing I was getting a little wobbly and manged to do an totally awesome backwards fall with a half twist and landed on my back. I promptly jumped up and expected some sort of applause from Matt, Ang and Stu but none of them actually saw me fall and I was very upset. I also fairly hurt my finger and swore it was broken, of course it wasn't but I had a gullet full of beer. During this time there was also a guy who was being particularly annoying to everyone around (no it wasn't me) and he was annoying the girls and dancing on the table, which you are not allowed to do. I thought I'd get rid of him and show him a lesson so when he got up on the table I lifted the end up a little to scare him, not knowing my exterme power I lifted the table a little too high and tipped him off of it. He jumped up and wasn't very happy and for some reason singled out little Stu as the culpret and promptly fly kicked him in the chest (nothing too bad though). Matt, Ang and I jumped in to tell him to settle down but luckily Stu went over to the burly bouncers and got him kicked out. It probably should have been me who should've been kicked out. Can you believe I'm 30 :)

The night came to an end but we (namely me) decided we should keep on going and got into a cab and told him to take us where the party was. We walked in and out of some clubs but most were either closing or were pretty dodgy (it was 2am at this point) so we went home via McDonalds. I wandered in and ordered us 10 cheeseburgers which we all munched on when we got home. Stu and Matt went to bed and Ang and I went down the back of the block of flats and had a massive chat until the early hours of the monring.

The next day as you can imagine we were all feeling a little shady but still on such a massive hight of having a fantastic night. Matt, Ang and I worked our we had probably consumed around 8-9 steins during the course of the day. That's 8-9 litres each so we were pretty proud. We got dressed and headed back into the festival for more bratwurst, schnitzel and to check out the site again. We had a wander round and went to the outdoor tent we went to on the first day for a sit down and a quiet beer. These were very quiet beers as we were all very hungover. We didn't stick around at the festival for long as we were all feeling very tired so we walked through the city in an attempt to find some sort of store that was open. Who'd have thought that in Munich all the stores were closed on a Sunday?? We found a snack place open at the main train station, got some food and a few cheeky beers (including one that was a litre can of beer) and then headed home for a quiet night of tele and napping. Thankfully Germany had many television stations in English, not like bloody France or Spain!

The Monday of the festival saw us heading back to the site for more drunken antics. We arrived at the site and, yes you guessed it, had some bratwurst and schnitzel. Angela had decided she didn't want to just drink the trip away (unlike the rest of us) so she went to a museum. Stu also had to go and visit a family friend so Amanda, Matt, Ang and I would went on our merry way to attack more rides. We went on the ferris wheel, the crazy mouse (which is nothing like the one at Brighton, it's much better) and then onto this huge roller coaster. It didn't have any loops but was really high with lots of bends. There was Amanda and I in the front and Ang and Matt behind us. Amanda is one of those girls who squeals the whole entire time so I knew I was in for an earsplitting ride. When we got to the top there is a massive drop and Amanda decided on the way down that she would put her hands up in the air and scream only to reaslise that coming up was a low pole that she almost hit. She was a little scared after that and kept her hands inside the ride at all times. When it finished she complained there were no signs telling her not to do it and how she was really scared she could have lost her arm. I then pointed to the sign above our heads as we got into the ride telling us this exact thing :) We went for a bit more of a walk around and ate these delicious chocolate covered fruit. I should point out this was the only fruit we consumed the entire time.

After this we decided 2pm was beer o'clock time and headed to the biggest tent in the site the Hofbrau Festzelt. What welcomed us was again a glorious, glorious sight. Tables of beer drinking folk all dressed up and singing and I swear most looked like they were absolutely hammered. We found a table and got round to the hard job of beer drinking. The table we managed to find was unfortunately next to all the old men and women in wheelchairs, yes we were in the retirement village section. But we had beer and a great waitress so we were happy. It was at this moment we found out that the waitresses in the big tents don't actually get paid and only get paid in tips. This is because of insurance and the cost of employing them. They must make a great packet of money though from all the drunks. For the record I only tipped her $4 Euro for our four beers which I think is generous. So during our beer we watched the antics and listened to everyone sing Ein Prosit over and over again. In the middle of tent there was this giant figurine holding a harp and everyone around it kept throwing their underwear/bras or wet napkins up in it. Apparently this is tradition. Can you see where this is going....no none of us did it but I think you know that I wanted to. Oh well next year. So after we finished our beer we had to leave as the table was booked for another party so we decided to go and check out some of the other tents.

We headed on up to the Hippodrome which was one of the smaller tents and had an outdoor section so we pulled up at a table and settled in for the count. Here Amanda was able to order little baby steins of wine so she was very happy. We had stein after stein, one of Stu's friends turned up, then both Stu and Angela came back and the party started. Ang told us of this story about her sister naming her pecs. One is called Des and the other Troy and together they Destroy. We all thought this was hilarious so Ang and I got our pecs out and drew the names on them and got them out at every opportunity. Anglea's were much more impressive than mine. We made friends with the people around us including a bunch of rowdy Americans and a few Swiss guys. Amanda and I did a little dance for everyone and even got applause. Ang and I ordered some more sausage and when it arrived hooked in. Our waiter came over and was quiet concerned when he saw us eating the skin, turned out we should have peeled it off and then eaten it. Oh well, it tasted quite nice.

The rest of the night was randoms conversations, Ang and Matt arm wrestling, for the record they tied. Amanda challenging the Americans to arm wrestles but telling them they had to let her win and then cheering wildly when she did win. Matt cheering Stu and smashing a stein into his tooth, chipping one of his front teeth. Poor Stu wasn't used to hanging out with rough Aussies. Ang's Swiss friend introduced us all to snuss which is tobacco you snort, we all had some and realised it is foul! I snorted it and then sneezed for about 10 minutes attemtping to get it out of my nose. Not fun!

The tent closed and we all decided to head into town for more drinks. We found some bar where Matt stood round talking to about 4 burly Bavarian blokes, Ang was yabbering away with the Swiss friend and Mandy and I entertained the crowded, dancing on tables and singing with the locals. We decided to head off to another bar for some reason but it was closed, Ang lost her wallet on the way so there was a mild panic about that. We ended up getting a cab and going home.

The next day we all woke to trecherous hangovers and packed up our rooms to get out by 10am and head out to the airport. After a very rough ride out to the airport we managed to checkin, find food and board the smallest plane in the entire world! Ok not that small but it had it's own stairs and there were only 3 seats on one side and 2 on the other. Amanda and I were a little nervous about the plane's weight and if it was evenly distributed....We got cheap flights to and from Munich but the reason this was cheap is because we went home via Zurich. Yes we got to spend 30 minutes in Switzerland where all we managed to do was inhale some Burger King then check on to our next plane and eventually arrive home in London at around 4:30pm. We landed at the London City airport and we had to catch the DLR back to our flat. We had a quick Thai dinner, watched bad tele and had a very early night.

Well I think that is it. I'm stuffed after writing this. I hope you all enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed doing it. I'm definitly back there next year!!!!!!


"Is this the way to Amarillo, every night I've been hugging my pillow, dreaming dreams of Amarilloand sweet Marie who waits for me"
Amarillo, Tony Christie