Munich. Oktoberfest. Beer.

Sunday:

I met Colin in London Heathrow Airport (he was coming from Hong Kong and I was coming from Boston). Together we flew to Munich and took the taxi from the airport to Munich. After a quick ride (sometimes going 190 kmh) and the second we checked into our room, we left to go to Theresienwiese where Oktoberfest is held. We got into Hippodrom and got into the party mode right away. The tent was decorated in hops. We met some friendly people. But the combination of no sleep the night before, big litre beer and glasses of bubbly had us going back to the hotel a mere 3 hours later. Apparently, people tend to stay as long as it takes (8 to 12 hours)! We were definite newbies.























Monday:

We were suppose to meet up with Justin, Amy and August. They were driving from Brussels but had ran into major traffic due to construction. So we were left on our own and explored Munich.

We went to Marienplatz and fell in love with this building with the red flowers spilling over the window boxes.


We stopped by Viktualienmarkt for some lunch. Viktualienmarkt is a colorful food market with a beer garden, of course. We found artfully displayed fruit and vegetables.



Colin and I shared schweinshaxen vom grill mit kartoffelsalat (grilled pork knuckle with potato salad). Incidentally, potato in forms of dumpling or salad and cabbage were our main and only vegetables eaten during the whole trip. We vowed to go vegetarian for a while when we get home.


After a brief rest in the late afternoon, we walked over to a nearby beer garden, Agustiner-Keller. We sat under ancient chestnut trees while eating our roast duck with (yet, again) potato dumplings. It was unusually un-crowded since most of the patrons are in Oktoberfest. So we enjoyed a relatively smoke-free dinner in a beautiful September night.

After dinner, we decided to walk over to Oktoberfest and see if we can still get in. Luckily, the doors to Augustiner-Festhalle were still open. We amazingly found space by the bandstand. We joined in the fun by standing on the bench, singing and dancing and occasionally raising the huge stein of good Augustiner beer. We were toasting with people who work in Holland and had ridden the company bus to Oktoberfest just for that night.



We stayed until closing and found the main thoroughfare festively lit up. It had a carnival/party feeling.














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