What I Learned Going To Ocktoberfest

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My husbands birthday was this month and he turned 50, he had wanted to do something different, so we headed over to Munich, Germany for the famous Oktoberfest. Contrary to what you might think, it starts in mid-September and goes into the first week of October.

This was part of a larger trip that I will write about another time. We arrived in Munich on the Friday before it started and had planned on going to the opening ceremonies. Honestly we had not done a whole lot of research before going so we had a lot to figure out.

Which brings me to my first lesson, if you want to sit down inside a tent and have a beer, it’s a good idea to reserve a seat at table. Unfortunately, we found out that you need to reserve about a year in advance. Well obviously we didn’t do that so we had to just show up and take our chances. Luckily we changed our minds and decided to go day two.

Lesson two; if you don’t reserve in advance go during the week, preferably in the morning. We ended up going at noon on Sunday, we were very fortunate. It was a lousy rainy day; but this was a good thing.

Sounds a little crazy right?

Actually no, it kept away a lot of the crowds. We were able to get into all the tents before they closed. Yes, the “tents” close and you then you are not allowed in, probably for the rest of the day.

I don’t know why they are called “tents”. There is nothing that is tent like about them. They are basically decorated warehouses with a fabric roof.

Lesson three; if you want to order a beer, you need to be seated in a tent. You cannot order a beer standing around, and that’s all we were able to do. You also cannot drink outside of the tents! There were no “beer stands” anywhere. So if you’re not in a tent, seated, no beer for you!

Luckily, we found some outside seating that was covered from the rain and we were able to secure a couple seats there and get our liters of beer.

Lesson four, don't be shy, you will have to ask people if you can sit at their tables. You are not going to find an open table.

Lesson five; bring cash, there are no credit cards accepted anywhere that I saw. Not even the souvenir stands where my husband bought a stein and a shirt.

Lesson six; bring headache medicine, we had the worst hangovers the next morning, something about the draft beer I think.

It was a lot of fun and I highly recommend it, just do some planning and learn from my mistakes.

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