Oktoberfest... Prost!

Ready for the novel coming your way? Good.

Thursday after class, I ran home and had to start packing right away. We left for the bus stop at 6:30ish (thank God) to meet up at 8. It took us a lot longer than expected. We quickly found our bus2alps group, which is the company we went to Oktoberfest with and grabbed some McDonald's for dinner in the train station. (Side note, McDonald's gave me Diet Coke instead of regular, and everyone who knows me knows how big of a no-no that really is!)

Our twelve hour bus ride to Munich went pretty quickly. They played movies the whole way, and it helped that we were driving through the night, so I slept most of the way. We all woke up at 10 am when we got there, checked into Jaeger's Hostel, cleaned ourselves up a bit, and went straight to the festival.

I had no idea what to expect, but I was pretty happy. The whole festival is like a grown up version of Disneyland! They had game booths, rides, and beer. Lots and lots of beer.

Whoever said DisneyWorld was the happiest place on earth has obviously never been to Oktoberfest!

We made it into one of the tents, Hofbrau Festzelt (or HB), which we were told was one of the largest and most popular. Day 1 was great, but we came home around 7 pm to get our minds and bodies ready for day 2.

My favorite!

Our hostel was a lot nicer than I was expecting. It's just a room with 6 beds and a bathroom. Luckily, I roomed with 5 other kids in my program who came on the same trip, so I didn't have to deal with the awkwardness of rooming with strangers.

Saturday morning came VERY quickly. We woke up at 6 am, had breakfast, and went straight to the tents. We stood outside the HB tent from 7:30 until 9:00, which you have to do if you even want a chance at a table. Saturday is definitely the busiest day of the festival, and since this weekend was the last weekend of Oktoberfest, we knew it was going to be even more insane.

Some of the people waiting outside HB at 7:30 am. The lines of people were on all 4 sides of me!

At 9 am when the doors opened, I thought I was going to die. People started pushing so hard that I was struggling to breathe. But all that lack of oxygen paid off! We all dashed inside and ran around like chickens with our heads chopped off. We grabbed the first table we could find, and Danny walked around to try to find some friends of his from back home. A few minutes later, he came back and told us that he had found the other kids from our group who we hadn't seen all weekend! We sprinted over to their table, and luckily they had enough room for all of us! It was so great to see them. And I could not believe Danny was able to find them in a tent with 7,000 people!

Our table location was so perfect. We were kind of in the middle of the room. To one side of us, we had a table of Italians in their mid-20s. On the other side if us, we had a table of Germans in their early 20s. Within an hour, we were all mixed together, and we had such a fun day getting to know everyone! We sang, drank a few steins, and ate some of the most incredible foods I have ever had. (Seriously, try the roasted chicken. Oh em gee, yum!)

Me with Nick and Danny. They bought the full lederhosen, and I just bought a dirndl top! We had to take a matching picture!

Our table! To the left were the Germans and to the right were the Italians! Such a great group!

At 3 pm, everyone got kicked out to let a new group of people into the tent. Yes, I was super bummed, but then I remembered I had been inside for 6 hours already! Once we got kicked out, we knew there was absolutely no way we would get into another tent. I would have been fine walking around the rest of the day, but then it started to rain. And rain. And rain. I swear it never stopped raining the whole time we were there. That made me grumpy, so we decided to go back to the hostel. On the way back, we found Starbucks! Almighty, Starbucks! Our soaking wet selves have never loved American coffee so much in our lives! Once we were back some people took a nap and others just hung out for awhile. A little later we grabbed dinner. Then Nick, Candace, and I went out and explored the area a little. Other than that, our night was pretty relaxing.

Sunday morning, we woke up early again. Tara, Claire, Candace, and I decided to go visit the Dachau concentration camp. It was cold, foggy, and rainy. It really set the mood of the day. Unfortunately, by the time we traveled there and back, we only got about 45 minutes actually at the camp. We didn't see much, but I think I had had enough already. I couldn't even get myself to go see the gas chambers or crematorium. I walked around in silence the whole time we were there, and no words can really describe what I felt. Numb is really the only way to put it.

The front gate to the camp.

This yard was full of bunkers. It looked like it went on for miles. 

At 12:30 pm, we all climbed back onto our buses and started the long drive home. This time, the bus ride was terrible. I tried napping the whole way back to make the time move faster. But it didn't. Finally, at around 2 am, we got back! Such a long trip, but SO worth it. Such a great experience and so many stories that I don't have time to share!

I woke up from my nap home to see this. How pretty!