Can you do a #latergram but on a blog? I guess I’ll find out.

Back in September 2018, Chase and I ventured to Munich for Oktoberfest. One of Chase’s close childhood friends now lives in Germany and speaks fluent German, so we lucked out with the perfect tour guide.

Oktoberfest is a huge carnival anchored with 14 different tents that house local Munich breweries and, in one tent, a winery. Carnival games, kiosks, and amusement rides pepper the fairgrounds as Germans and tourists alike wander around dressed in lederhosen and dirndls.

I found my dirndl on amazon, after too much searching. A dirndl has three parts — the undershirt, the dress itself, and the apron. Most ladies at Oktoberfest wear the knee-length dirndls. I paired my dirndl with combat boots — for walking and the sticky floors. I brought a small purse just for euros since there isn’t room for larger bags. It can also get cold, so seeing cardigans is not uncommon. The festival sells all kinds of cute accessories — I ended up purchasing a flower crown to add to my outfit.

Our group visited three tents: Paulaner, Hacker Pschorr, and Ochsenbraterei. To avoid crowds, we planned our drunken escapades for weekdays, specifically Tuesday through Thursday. Post flight Tuesday, around mid-afternoon, we arrived at Paulaner. Still early for the partying, our visit to Paulaner remained calm and a subtle introduction to Oktoberfest.

The next day, we gave Hacker Pschorr a try. Here, our group of five was seated in the center of the action, next to the band. We met both Germans and Americans, sung “Country Roads”, threw food at people who couldn’t chug their liters, and downed several Maß (pronounced mass, meaning a liter of beer in German). Hands down, Hacker Pschorr had my favorite tent decor; stars adorned the sky-themed rafters while letting the natural light peer in. We spent about 8 hours in this tent, which flew by.

Throughout the fairgrounds, souvenir kiosks sell the same, but distinctly Oktoberfest gifts. There’s chicken hats, glass steins, tshirts, etc. But at this point, two days in, these cute gingerbread necklaces kept catching my eyes. The necklaces weighed down the kiosks from their sheer volume and variety. You buy a necklace for your sweetheart, and they say all kinds of cute things like “treasure”, “I love you”, and “princess”. Chase gifted me the “princess” one on our last day. They’re not edible; a year and a half later mine shows no sign of decomposition.

On our last evening, we shut it down at Ochsenbraterei. I’m not a huge fan of German food. I always end up losing weight when visiting Germany since I avoid eating. However, Ochsenbraterei had the best German food — its staple was roast oxen (which is on display!). I also sampled a radler here for the first time — half beer, half lemonade. They taste great and help you pace your blood alcohol content levels!

At Oktoberfest, the tents close before the festival does. After last call, everyone drunkenly runs from the tents to soak in the last hour of carnival games and rides. Always keep some extra euros around to pay for the (albeit pricey) games and rides. Although not the best idea, we beelined it to the bumper cars, spending our last euros of the trip.

That’s about it for our Oktoberfest experience. We booked flights and Airbnb early to avoid any overbooked craziness. Going on weekdays allowed us to avoid any table reservations — even though we went as a group of 5. Now is a good time to start booking and planning everything!