Oktober Fest

Knifey_Spoony

Hi,
Planning on heading over to the oktober fest this year with some mates. Has anyone here ever been to it before? Just looking for any advice etc or experiences of it you may have. Gonna organise our trip soon me thinks to get accomodation etc sorted. Looking forward to any replies Das ist gut ya!

mackerski

Blinky1 wrote:

Hi,
Planning on heading over to the oktober fest this year with some mates. Has anyone here ever been to it before? Just looking for any advice etc or experiences of it you may have. Gonna organise our trip soon me thinks to get accomodation etc sorted. Looking forward to any replies Das ist gut ya!

It's spelt "ja" BTW...

Yes, I've "been" several times. The best advice is to live in Munich when you go there (Which I did, or more recently I stayed with friends, that works too). It's about the only sure-fire way of getting accommodation. The other way is to book as early as possible. Don't bother trying to book accommodation near the Theresienwiese (premium price) - Anywhere in U-or-S-Bahn reach is just as good, though if you want to extend your night at a late bar it's better to be convenient to a night-tram route or at least close enough to the city centre for a cheap taxi ride home.

You should keep in mind that actually getting into a beer tent is non-trivial, especially on a week-end and most particularly of all on the middle week-end, which is the traditional time the Italians descend on the Wies'n and clog up the surrounding streets with motorhomes. To make matters worse, there always seems to be a big Champions League (I think) football match on on the middle Saturday too, further swelling the rowdier guests.

As you probably know, the Oktoberfest lasts for two weeks and three weekends and ends on the first Sunday in October. If you can possibly manage it, arrange to be there during the week. Daytime during the week is a much easier time to get seated in a tent.

It's very helpful if the weather's good, because:

* It means that sitting outside a tent in the biergarten is an option (though they fill up too).

* Even if you fancy the crack inside, it's easier to find space, as some visitors will prefer the biergarten or go for a ramble outside (if it's raining, they'll stay put).

* Wet rollercoaster seats make your bum wet.

Good food and drink tips:

* Eat while there. The beer, and you'll end up drinking a lot of it, may make you forget to, but you will seriously regret a day of drinking it on an empty tum. Brez'n (pretzels) are a good beer snack, and the giant ones are very tasty.

* Roasted, sugared almonds in a Tüte (pokey bag) are yummy, as are "Aus'zogne" (deep-fried, sugared, doughy thing, vaguely doughnutty). Both available from stalls.

* Augustiner Bier is the best. This will show in the demand for space in the tents.

* The Fischer Vroni tent (Augustiner) specialises in fish. Steckerlfisch (fish-on-a-stick) is not to be missed, mackerel is the most popular.

* The Ochsenbraterei tent (Spaten) always has a whole Ox roasting on a spit. They chalk up the Oxes name too, so you know who you're eating. A tasty snack is the Ochsensemmel (Roast Ox meat in a bun). You can order this from a hatch near the side door. Even when the tent is closed (which is what happens when they get too full), the security man on the side door will usually let you in if you say you only want an Ochsensemmel. Very occasionally, if the meat of an ox is running low, you'll get less appealing contents in your semmel, but usually it's really good.

* Half-a-chicken (ein halbes Hend'l) is the most traditional Oktoberfest dish. Always excellent.

* The locals will complain about the price of a Mass (lit. measure, the 1l glass of beer you get). The price goes up every year, and compares unfavourably with pub and biergarten prices. Agree with them, even though it's probably no more than you'd pay here for Harp.

* A Masskrug (the glass) is not referred to as a Stein.

* When clinking your glasses (anstossen), don't adopt the grip where your hand goes right through the handle. You'll smash your fingers.

* Do clink your glasses regularly while drinking, especially when you receive a fresh beer. Do this too with your table neighbours, it's good manners. Always make eye contact with the person with whom you're clinking. This is superstition - failure to do so guarantees seven years' bad sex (some may consider this more a promise than a threat...)

* Waiting staff appreciate a (small) tip. Generally rounding to the nearest Euro is fine.

More general tips:

* Tables with tablecloths are reserved. However, if you are hard-necked, you can sometimes do well on them. Firstly, they often lie vacant until the reservation is due to start. The waiting staff, if already present, may be prepared to serve you until the appointed time arrives. Furthermore, there's usually a "use it or lose it" arrangement, whereby if the table isn't claimed by the rightful owner within a certain time, it becomes fair game and you can stay. Some friends and I once did this and the rightful owners were forced to share the table with us (we graciously made space for them - it was a pleasant evening).

* It will generally cost you to do even a wee wee in the tent toilets. There are usually queues for cubicles. Gents should always head for the "pissoir" for number ones, for reasons of speed and cost. The ones outside of the tents (in the grounds proper) are always free. In fact, I think the cubicles outside are too, in recent years, because it was seen as discrimination against women to charge for them.

* If you think you can speak German, you may be in for a shock. The Bavarian dialect is alive and well, especially during the Wies'n when lots of usually-non-dialect users dust it off along with their Lederhosen. Non-Bavarian Germans often can't understand it. Be warned.

* Lederhosen are not funny, nor are they cause for ridicule. And the wearers of them are often bigger than you. And there are more of them than you.

* The police and security staff take their jobs seriously - they have to. Avoid drunken confrontation, under no circumstances engage in fisticuffs nor antisocial behaviour (weeing where you shouldn't). Don't try to swipe a Masskrug - they're cheap enough to buy. They will often search rucksacks on your way off the grounds (and on the way in, BTW, so avoid bringing, say, glass bottles with you).

* Beer "tents" are actually more like eleborate, decorative, wooden prefabs the size of football pitches, complete with balconies.

* The Ozzies like to hang out in the Hofbräu tent. They seem to have established for themselves a tradition whereby you shouldn't wear any underpants while there. People have been accosted on the way in and asked whether they had any on. I can't work out which answer is best. Say you do and they may try to forcibly remove it. Say you don't and you could be asked for proof. Worth knowing, either way.

* There is a Theresienwiese U-Bahn station. However, the grounds are so massive that it can often make sense to follow the signs to one of the other nearby stations - Goetheplatz, Schwanthalerhöhe or Hackerbrücke (S-Bahn).

* Enjoy it, it's great. You can meet the friendliest people there. I once fell into a casual conversation ("oh!, you're Irish") which ended with my being invited to a reserved table to meet Chris de Burgh, who was visiting that day. (He'd departed by the time we got up, but a seat with free beer is still fine in my book)

Any help?

Dermot

Knifey_Spoony

Thank you so much for all that info! Wow, im a bit overwhelmed to be honest

I've been checking out the official site and they mention reserving tables. Would you recommend this? Or should we just turn up early enough and hope for the best?

Also is it easy enough to move around, or once you have a table should you hold onto it? Do people move around between the different tents much or just find a good one and stay put? Sorry bout these questions, the answers are probably pretty obvious to you.
Oh, and another thing, is there other alcoholic drink available or is it purely beer? (got a mate who's worried bout this. He adament he's gonna smuggle some naggans in with him!? the mind boggles as to why he's attending a "beer" fest)

If you had to recommend one or two tents, that in your experience have everything (great craic, fun music, good food & beer, close enough to everything etc) which ones would they be?
I really cant wait to experience it all. But i reckon no amount of research will prepare me. Roll on Sept

sinjin_smythe

Did you say Scotchtoberfest ??????


cause if you did !!!

sickle

mmmm augustiner all the way baby!! why cant you get it here,WHHHHYYYY!!!

mackerski

Blinky1 wrote:

Thank you so much for all that info! Wow, im a bit overwhelmed to be honest

No bother - if I decide to make a last-minute visit this year, maybe I'll try to lig onto any table you reserve/find...

Blinky1 wrote:

I've been checking out the official site and they mention reserving tables. Would you recommend this? Or should we just turn up early enough and hope for the best?

It's well worth considering, especially for days on the weekend. If you still can, that is. Generally, to reserve you have to prebook a certain minimum number of vouchers. At least some tents have the option of a voucher that includes a stub for a waitress tip of the kind of nominal amount considered polite. This is worth doing, since you can't do the usual rounding to a Euro when no cash changes hands. Reserved tables tend to be at the sides of tents or on balconies. They sometimes lack the intimacy of the long trestle benches elsewhere. That wouldn't trouble me too much, since you're never unaware of the band and atmo.

"Turning up early enough" is risky, since "early enough" is poorly specified. Don't count on that one - though with a group, if you do manage to nobble a table (or good portion thereof), you can generally take it in turns to keep it occupied. When doing this, people will often ask if you have room. Always say yes, partly for politeness, partly because it's a good way to meet people, but mostly because the waitress will overrule you anyway. She needs turnover to make her money, she doesn't want to watch half a table nursing their beer. Just make sure the new friends know that there are more people returning "but we'll fit you in somehow".

Blinky1 wrote:

Also is it easy enough to move around, or once you have a table should you hold onto it? Do people move around between the different tents much or just find a good one and stay put? Sorry bout these questions, the answers are probably pretty obvious to you.

What you have, you hold. "Spatz in der Hand...". Basically, you'll be damn lucky to find space for the lot of you. If you can't get some of you seated, the others can go rollercoasting, or dogem-ing or whatever. Sooner or later, your table neighbours will drift off and you can expand your presence. Dunno how big your group is, but splitting into subgroups to do the non-drinking stuff is a good plan. Also, if you have reserved, you can't just all feck off between drinks - the table will be given away if you do that.

Blinky1 wrote:

Oh, and another thing, is there other alcoholic drink available or is it purely beer? (got a mate who's worried bout this. He adament he's gonna smuggle some naggans in with him!? the mind boggles as to why he's attending a "beer" fest)

If he won't see sense on the bottle smuggling, tie him up and leave him in the hotel room. I'm not joking. You can get sekt (sparkling white wine) in the Nymphermerger tent and some other places, can't remember about the main beer tents (never tried). I recall there being schnapps at certain stalls, but I could be thinking of other fests. There is no surer way of being pegged out of tent or grounds than having smuggled drink (or a glass bottle, not sure what's worse). There'll be enough alco for him - just possibly not in the main tent. But if somebody will keep him company while he goes out for a sekt/whatever he can drink minerals or Apfelsaftschorle (apple juice/fizzy water mix) in the tent. And just maybe other alcohol in some of them.

There's a lot to be done at the Wies'n even for a teetotaller - it's a big family event. Picture Funderland with booze.

Blinky1 wrote:

If you had to recommend one or two tents, that in your experience have everything (great craic, fun music, good food & beer, close enough to everything etc) which ones would they be?
I really cant wait to experience it all. But i reckon no amount of research will prepare me. Roll on Sept

Augustinerbier all the way. The crack is similar in most, with a particular Ozzie/debauched edge on it in the Hofbräu tent. If you can get inside it... All breweries make well-drinkable Oktoberfest beer, even if their normal brew is sometimes iffy. My personal favourite brews, in some sort of order:

Ausustiner (including Fischer Vroni for Steckerlfisch)
Paulaner
Spaten (including Ochsenbraterei for Ox meat)
Löwenbräu
Hacker-Pschorr

But I say, take the first seats you spot, even if that's in a biergarten. You can always send scouts out once in place.

Dermot

Knifey_Spoony

Thanx Dermot Im sure that will help LOADS! I'll keep you posted on how our plans are coming along.
Thanx again. I'll have a Augustiner or two in your honour