The Biggest Volksfest on Earth

 
And we're back :o)  That was such a great weekend!  Jesse and I haven't been very good about going on regular dates, but we seem to be making up for it just fine with these "date weekends" about every other month or so! 

After we dropped the girls and all their gear off at Paula and Brandon's on Friday night, we came back home and walked down to one of our favorite restaurants in Otterberg for a nice, quiet meal. 

I'm kicking myself for forgetting to take a picture of the huge pile of pack 'n plays, booster seats, car seats, clothes, toys, diapers, and food we lugged up into the Amrein's house.  Those two little girls certainly don't pack light ;o)

I dragged Jesse's butt out of bed around 5:30am on Saturday.  We were trying to hit the road in time to catch the opening parade at noon, but we hit a lot of traffic on the way in, so no dice.  Not to worry friends, there was still plenty of fun to be had!

Let's start with the food: GIANT pretzels, huge gingerbread heart necklaces, super super long hot dogs, platters of meats and cheeses, and of course, plenty of beer! 

I was really impressed with the actual Oktoberfest brew at our beer hall... it tasted so much better than the Sam Adam's I'm used to ;o)  Jesse disagrees, though.  He still misses his Sam.

Now on to the rides.  This surprised us a little!  We didn't realize that it's set up as a huge carnival, too!  There were four roller coaster's people!  I haven't been on a coaster since before Jesse and I got married (more on this in my next post!) so I was super excited about that.

You have to pay for each ride separately (and they ain't cheap!) so we hit up the ferris wheel for the view and then the best looking roller coaster. 

Here's the bird's eye view from the top of the ferris wheel.  I read that sometimes they can have up to 500,000 visitors in a day!  The long buildings are the "beer tents" but they look more like... long buildings ;o)  If you don't buy tickets in advance you have to wait in long lines to get in, if you get in at all. 

And there's the Bavaria Statue overlooking the fair grounds.  It's massive!

We were too late to get tickets to the beer tents at the actual fest, but our friend found tickets to a table at a beer hall that was only a couple blocks from Oktoberfest.  We waited for a little bit for the doors to open and I admired the adorable little kids dressed in their traditional Bavarian garb!

Once inside the eight of us shared a deliciously massive platter of food and our first round of refreshing Oktoberfest beer!  They serve it in ginormous one liter glass mugs... insane!

Once the band really got going was when the real fun started.  I'm not usually super big on partying and even dancing, cause I feel like a dweeb... but it's impossible not to join in on the fun! 

When we first started talking about going to Oktoberfest I wasn't really into it... I just imagined it to be a crazy drunken frat party and I didn't think it sounded that fun (as we're not the crazy drunken type!).  But I wanted to go at least check it out.  Seems silly to live four and a half hours from Munich and not check out the world's biggest beer fest! 

Needless to say, we ended up having a ball!  One thing I'd read/heard about Oktoberfest is the feeling that everyone in your tent is your friend.  And it was true!  I'll never forget how fun it was to be standing up on the benches (with what felt like the whole hall by the end of the night) and giving everyone around me a "Prost" (German toast).  The age range in the crowd went from teens up to little old ladies.  We ended the night with a group of Italians at our table. 

I think my favorite memory was everyone dancing at singing at the top of their lungs to "Sweet Caroline" :o)  The German's seriously know how to party! 

So I didn't know it was on my bucket list, but I'm happy I can now say, "Oktoberfest, CHECK!"