Round 2!

Friday, September 23 - Sunday, September 25 2011

In general we aim not to repeat trips in the relatively short amount of time we have over here in Europe.  However, when it comes to a massive event like Oktoberfest, exceptions can be made!  Yes, it’s that time of year again where Munich hosts a three-week beer drinking festival which hosts over 6 million people each year.  It’s hard to believe it’s this big until you see an aerial view of the fair grounds and gawk at the sheer number of people gathered there (these photos are from when we scaled a nearby church tower to get a bird’s eye view of Oktoberfest).  

A large driver of why we decided to make it two years in a row was that a bunch of our work friends decided they all wanted to go this year, so we decided to tag along.  But, we needed to switch it up a little bit this year…Yes, that means official Lederhosen and Dirndl attire!  As if this wasn’t enough, one of our crazy co-workers (named Travers) decided that himself, Dave and our friend Mike needed to grow mustaches.  Why mustaches for a German Oktoberfest?  We still can’t figure that out.  Regardless, the plan was set and the facial hair grew.

Instead of taking a 7-hour train like last year and staying a good 30 minutes out of town, our early planning allowed us to find cheaper airfare and a decent price on a hotel right in the middle of town.  The plan was to fly in after work Friday evening.

Quick side note… Ang found out after we had already booked our Oktoberfest plans that she was invited to our Europe-Middle East-Africa (EMEA) team’s annual offsite in Malta from Wednesday to Friday that week.  This meant on Friday she had to take three flight legs to get to Munich (Malta – Zurich – Geneva – Munich).  Fun stuff!  The conference was worth it though (who says ‘no’ to Malta anyway?) and she was able to meet face-to-face tons of people she converses with over phone & email.  One fun fact about Malta— in the year 60 A.D. the Apostle Paul was shipwrecked onto the island and as a result introduced Christianity there (as described in the books of Acts, chapters 27 & 28).  Here are a few pictures of what Ang got to enjoy seeing…

 

Back to Munich.  One of the reasons we were hesitant to come back this year is that our experience last year of making it into the beer tents felt like a really lucky one which we didn’t think we could replicate.  Last year we happened to be in the right place, at the right time, with the right people.  Our friend Leslie who was researching beforehand, however, read that the mornings are a free-for-all, no reservations required (reservations are practically impossible to come by anyway).  So our plan, as painful as it sounds, was to wake up bright and early on Saturday morning and hit the tents!

By 9:30 our group made it into the fairgrounds and we were urgently looking for a place to go among the thousands of others doing the same.  As we were trying to coordinate the different groups of Expedia folks, we randomly converged on the Hofbrau tent.  By 10 or so everyone was in – we could barely believe it all worked out!  (The only casualty was our friend Jaime who missed the memo in time to make it over to our tent before it reached capacity.   It’s ok though because he had a good friend from the States that flew out to spend the weekend with him, so we knew he was in good hands).  

 

Ang trying to compete with the
beer maids - but not so impressive. 
In one hand, they can carry 8 of these full.

When it’s your second year, it’s hard to not make comparisons between the two.  Last year at the Lowenbrau tent, there was a great live band playing famous hits and it was basically a large sing-along.  The Hofbrau, however, was a little light on the sing-alongs.  When the band finally started playing halfway through the session, it was mostly German folky-music.  It was still plenty of fun, but not as engaging—mostly since we didn’t know any of the German words. :)  This didn’t matter much though, because this year we had plenty of friends to talk to and the quieter atmosphere was almost welcome. 

So how did everyone do?  It was interesting, every once in a while we would turn around and say “where’s so and so?”  People were dropping off consistently until only us, our friends Mike + Michelle and Travers + Megan were left.  At about 3:30 when we were all tired of drinking beer (and distracting each other to look away while we quietly repurposed our beers into each other’s glasses), and decided it was a good time for a nap.

Later that evening the six of us met up again, only this time is was at the official Hofbrauhaus in Old Town.  You may remember this from last year as the place where we saw the German whips.  We got there too late however to see any entertainment so we grabbed a quick traditional German meal, a beer (of course) and then called it a night. 

The next day we did the Rick Steves walking tour of Munich.  There were many interesting things about Munich, tied back to WWII.  As we had learned at the Residenz Museum last year, much of Munich was destroyed from allied bombs-- and the city has spent many decades re-building structures to their original state.  The sites we learned about this year were St. Peter’s Church, Frauenkirche (the church where crazy King Ludwig II, from Neischwanstein Castle, is buried), St. Michael’s Church (where the current Pope served for many years), and essentially the entire downtown block where the Hofbrauhaus (and other stores) were rebuilt.  Below are some current and war-torn photos of the sites.  We've noticed in some of the cities we've visited (and Munich is a perfect example of this) that while a building is being re-built, there will often be a fake facade (usually vinyl) that is an exact replica of what the building should look like (examples below)-- until you get close to the building, often times you have no idea it's fake!

Photo of war damage

Frauekirche:

Fake facade

 

  

St. Michael's Church: 

Photo of war damage

  

Downtown Photos:

Another fake facade

Hofbrauhaus

Another fake facade

Some other interesting sites we walked by were…

Marienplatz – the main center of Munich and the site of one of Dave’s favorite structures in all of Europe (the new Town Hall building). 

Viktualienmarkt – Rick loves his Saturday morning markets (so does Ang and most other women, let’s be honest), however we attended on Sunday when most everything was closed.  They were serving food so we did have a quick meal and a beer at the alternating beer counter (Munich’s breweries take turns serving at this counter, changing out every couple of days).  Delicious!

Jewish Synagogue – Considering we couldn’t go in, it was a quick stop.  However, the interesting shape is worth showing.

And of course a little Nazi history, this is a major Germany city after all!  At the end of the Rick Steves walk we entered Platz der Opfer des Nationalsozialismus (“Square of the Victims of Nazism”), where a couple grand buildings served as Nazi administration buildings.  The one on the left (below) was actually Hitler’s main residence when in Munich.  We’re not sure why these buildings were left untouched when so much else of Munich was destroyed – they seemed like pretty important targets and were right out in the open?

We headed back to the airport later that evening and met up with the rest of the Expedia crew, tired and worn out from an intense weekend.   So there you have it – our first repeat trip.  It was once again a great trip to Munich.  We aren’t sure when we’ll make it back again, but we certainly have the attire to do so!