Oktoberfest in Munich

In a hungover state the day after the event I learned that Oktoberfest is the second largest festival in the world, after Carnival in Rio de Janiero.  After seeing the crowds in one single tent (one of 38) I am not at all surprised by this information.

Our friends Philipp and Lara moved to Munich, home of the OG Oktoberfest, just prior to the event in 2023, which ironically starts in September.  I wasted no time securing our spot for Oktoberfest 2024 as I knew they would have visitors lining down the block wanting to stay with them, and I was absolutely right.  First in, best dressed as the Aussies say!

They came to visit us earlier in the year, making them our tenth visitors since we got to Norway a mere 3 years ago.  We went to their wedding in 2018 (seven months after they attended ours) and I stopped for a weekend at theirs in Singapore on my way to India.  The icing on the cake of these great friends is they have kids just a tish younger than ours.  

Having young kids complicates beer drinking activities, but as I learned a few months prior in Copenhagen, the key to making travel with kids happen is to have other kids for ours to play with.  Their huge apartment and novel selection of toys meant we could get down to the very important business of drinking lots and lots (and lots) of beer while the children entertained themselves.

But first, one cannot attend Oktoberfest in regular street clothes!  One must outfit themselves in a dirndl (ladies) or lederhosen (gents).

What I love about tracht (traditional German garments) is the diversity.  I swear no two are the same, at least for the ladies, and there are literally thousands upon thousands of different styles on display, all of them stylish and gorgeous.

October 3rd is German Unity Day, a public holiday to commemorate East and West Germany reunifying, though the date the wall actually fell was November 9th, so I'm quite confused as to why this holiday is in early October.  But no complaints here, as it falls during Oktoberfest and our friends were off work that day.  With most Germans off work (the rarest of rare sights) the atmosphere was very much bumping and festive for us.

It is possible to walk in to find a seat at most tents, I think, but I know it's best to book a table in advance.  I never wrapped my head around the whole process, and thank goodness we had people to do our bidding for us because managing all that on our own seems highly overwhelming and, in true German style, only available in German.  I just showed up looking fine and let others do all the choosing and booking for me.

Let me just say there was not as much boobage on display as I was anticipating.  I would say the dirndls that were really tarted up were worn by tourists while the German ladies were surprisingly buttoned up and conservative.

Our daytime booking was at the Fischer-Vroni tent, known as a more adult and civilized tent, with a capacity of 3,162.  It's also known for their fish on a stick:

Though I saw them being smoked outside I never actually saw anybody eating one inside.  But I saw plenty of people eating these bad boys:

Ours was one of the 17 large tents, and there are 21 small tents.  From what I can tell the difference is small tents seat hundreds of people and large tents can seat thousands.  

Over the 2 week event this year there were 6.7 million visitors who consumed...drum roll please...7 million liters of beer.  My guess is I contributed about 15 of those liters when you factor in the radlers, a.k.a. shandy, which is beer mixed with lemonade.

Each tent has a band or, I'm guessing, multiple bands based on the number of hours they are rocking out.  Our band was on a boat-looking platform, this being a nautical themed tent.

They play mostly German folk tunes I'd never heard, but they snuck in several more recognizable tunes, especially as the crowd got drunker.  My personal favorites were Achey Breaky Heart, Sweet Caroline and 99 Luftballons, German edition.  Those last two really got the crowd going and were a turning point in drunkenness for the day, I would say.  

Still haunting my dreams is Ein Prosit, a song that encourages you to chug your beer.  I don't know how true this is, but the friends of Philipp and Lara we were with said that the tents estimate their beer sales based on how frequently this song is played.  And it is played a lot.  Max every 15 minutes, maybe more.

I'm so impressed by how much the waiters can carry at once!  I only saw male waiters, as where popular culture previously led me to believe most were female.  Word on the street is they can make €20,000 in a single two-week Oktoberfest, and I believe it.  They work so incredibly hard and it must be exhausting on all levels.

We had a hearty German lunch, perfect for soaking up several liters of beer, which were brought out on these massive trays that are 3x the size of any restaurant tray I've ever seen.

I never saw a single spill or drop, which is almost impossible to believe with all the drunken people wandering around and the massive loads that these waiters carry.

Our booking was from noon to 5pm, the most civilized booking time, both in terms of milieu and having kids at home with a babysitter.  Our table was up on the second floor, which means no standing on the benches (lest you fall over the ledge and die) so we were in the most civilized part of the most civilized tent.  It was perfect for me!  But make no mistake, it was no stodgy tea party.  "Civilized" just means nobody was vomiting in the aisles or body surfing naked along the tables.  There was much drunkenness to be had in our civilized tent. 

After many pints, much gaiety and 50 repeats of Ein Prosit our delightful booking time was over.  We had to skedaddle so they could prepare for the boisterous 6-10:30pm seating. 

So time for more Oktoberfesting!

For the ladies at least.  And in a new tent this time, Armbrustschutzenzelt.

The papas would be reuniting in Berlin in less than one month for a concert and weekend away from parenting responsibilities, so you damn well better believe that it was the mamas who took the opportunity to kick on after our regularly scheduled boozing ended.

This time we had no booking, so had to do the dreaded walk-in scramble to find a table with strangers.  There were 4 of us, and the bigger the group the harder it is to find an open table.  As the only non-German speaker among us all I did was shut up and follow them until we found our place, which seemed incredibly quick and easy (though admittedly my memory was fading at this point).

This place was way wilder than the previous tent, though the time of day (and hours spent drinking by everyone in attendance) almost certainly plays a factor in that.  It felt way more tightly packed, but then again we were in gen pop here, rather than the luxurious mezzanine.  Exclusively standing on the benches was pretty much expected here.

We tapped out at about 9 p.m. - nine hours after we started - and promptly wolfed down a currywurst, which I had wanted to eat but thought was strictly a Berlin delicacy.  And then we...rode a freaking roller coaster?

The question mark is because it feels like a fever dream that didn't actually happen, but I am 99.5% sure it did.  A drunken roller coaster!  What ever could go wrong?  Thankfully no barfing occurred...that I can recall.

The next morning I, predictably, felt rough as guts (again, Aussie saying).  How do Germans cure this unpleasant sensation?  A pot of white weiners, of course.

Along with hair of the dog - which I was having none of, thank you very much.

We went to Der Pschorr, a really beautiful brewery and restaurant located on the popular outdoor Viktualienmarkt farmers market.

The weather was pretty terrible for 90% of our visit, which sadly put the kaibosh on any desire I had to see the sights of Munich.  We had been once before, in early 2011 during our Edinburgh student days, but were there strictly to see friends and spent all our time drinking and none of our time sight seeing.  One of these decades I'll actually see the city of Munich, but the 2020s is not that decade.

While Martin and the boys went out seeing a little bit of the city (namely the inside of more breweries) the ladies went straight home with the kids for some much needed napping and hangover recovery.

The next day the skies cleared just long enough for us to make a return to the Oktoberfest fairgrounds, this time with our adorably dressed children in tow:

Authentic matching German dirndls!  Theirs were more authentic than mine and, as such, actually cost more than mine did!  But rest assured Martin's all-leather get up cost more than the three of ours combined.

We visited Oide Wiesn with the kids, an old timey tent that, unlike Oktoberfest as a whole, has a small entrance fee.  We dined on the classic German dishes of spaetzle, schnitzel and schupfnudeln.  I swear if I had to choose one cuisine to eat for the rest of my life it very likely would be German.

And took what just might be my favorite picture of Fiona ever:

How adorable is this?!  Note this is apple juice...in a super heavy half liter stein.  It was ridiculously heavy for a vessel intended for children.  Impressively these Germans don't coddle their kids with sippy tops and straws.

We took a spin on a few carousels, but time was not on our side as we didn't arrive until late afternoon due to weather.  We would've spent way more time there with the kids if the weather had cooperated.  I had no idea how family friendly Oktoberfest as a whole is, outside of the beer tents.  It's really just a fun fair with a side order of alcohol poisoning!

Finally - finally - on our last day the sun came out and the weather was reliably good for outdoor activities.

We went to Koniglicher Hirschgarten, royal deer garden, a park featuring live deer and an enormous beer garden.  I was disappointed that the deer were behind a fence, as they were free range at the park we visited in Vejle, Denmark.  These picky deer also wouldn't eat the chestnuts we had lovingly gathered for them; they only wanted the pellet food you had to buy at a ridiculous mark-up.

Fascinating thing about the beer garden: most of the eight thousand seats are available for you to BYOFood.

A small number of tables are reserved for the restaurant, but as long as you buy beer you can picnic at the other tables.  I love it!  I currently live where alcohol laws are downright puritanical, so the German culture around normalizing public alcohol consumption is truly fascinating to me.  I wonder if their statistics around alcohol-related social problems (alcoholism, crime, etc.) are better or worse than other places?

I have only one Oktoberfest regret: I didn't see the "Devil's wheel" ride in action, which you may have seen on social media.  It is a hilarious concept and would be so fun to watch.  I saw the outside of it, but to see the action you have to pay to go inside.  My cheap ass would've happily paid to watch that if we had time, but alas there wasn't a moment on the fairgrounds to spare to watch.  Sad, sad.  

I did (pre-drunkenly) get to briefly watch The Toboggan, another hilarious and insane carnival ride, and I wish we had spent our roller coaster riding time watching more of that instead.  These rides are insane!  And must be so dangerous to drunkards like myself who have consumed 15 liters of beer.

And that's a wrap for our 4-day Oktoberfest extravaganza.  It was really great, and made entirely possible by our dear friends in Munich.  Infinite thanks to Philipp and Lara for hosting us!

This trip was a turning point for us.  A first:

The first time we've had to pay for Fiona to have her own seat, because she's now over 2 years old.  Good for my sanity and skeleton, terrible for my bank account!

Copenhagen, Denmark

Fifteen years ago I went to Copenhagen for a weekend, with my mother-in-law and our benefactor:

Martin's great-aunt Elsa, who, at 95 years of age, wanted go to Copenhagen for "one last trip".  Little did she know at the time that she would have thirteen more years left in her, finally dying in 2022 at age 108!  Understandably she never did make it back, so I hope we provided her one last rockin' trip to the Danish capital.

It would not be my last trip, however.  1.5 decades and two kids later I would return.

We met up with friends from Pennsylvania, Pia and Ryan, who visited us in Norway 2 years ago when I was literally about to pop with Fiona.  I love not being pregnant, and equally love the idea of meeting friends in fun destinations.  Our friends are so widespread I feel like a holiday with "just us" is a waste of precious travel time and money.  I realize this makes me a terrible wife and mother, but it also makes me a good friend.

We could have gotten on a plane for a 1 hour flight to Copenhagen, but we had 3 daycare-free weeks to fill, so chose the slower means of transport:

The closest thing to a cruise I've ever been on!  A meat cruise some (we) call it, as it is customary for Norwegians to stock up on duty free meat and alcohol onboard as it is much cheaper than in Norway.

We were completely without [motorized] wheels throughout this entire journey.  We took the train from home to Oslo, walked 20 minutes to the ferry terminal, boarded the ship where we promptly began drinking at the outdoor deck bar.

Fiona was asleep in her pram and Freya, just in the very beginning of the stage of life when she's tolerable to take anywhere, busied herself coloring.  It was a tiny taste of our previous (dearly beloved) life of carefree travels, and it was nothing short of glorious.

It is really a beautiful journey out of the Oslo harbor, though chasing after two littles we didn't get to stop and enjoy the scenery until we were out in the open ocean.  There's a pool onboard, restaurants, and a kids play area that sells beer comparatively cheap to Norway.  We entertained ourselves (beer) as best we could between departure at 3pm (beer) until we docked in Copenhagen the next morning (switch from beer to coffee) at 10am. 

Our Airbnb was in an incredible central location, and as we were dropping off our luggage we saw a huge crowd gathering at the Amalienborg Castle, literally right next door.

It was a changing of the guards ceremony at the official residence of the Danish royal family.  Our neighbors for the week!

Boat tour

We met up with our travel companions and they were literally coming straight off an international flight, so thankfully Pia had pre-planned a fab daytime activity to keep themselves awake and keep us all entertained while we awaited check-in at our accommodation.

Within the first few hours of arrival we saw all the highlights of Copenhagen from our private boat.  Its capacity was approximately 150 people less than the standard tourist vessel, so I feel very fortunate to get a VIP experience compared to the gargantuan boats most people get.  

Copenhagen is really pretty from the water and the weather was perfection.  Never a guarantee during Scandinavian summer!  Highlights of the boat tour include: bare boob sunbathers, bunjee jumpers from a crane, a sea plane taking off and:

The Little Mermaid statue

Away from the crowd, so very VIP!  I felt so fancy seeing her from a different vantage point and becoming a tourist attraction ourselves.  A Chinese woman was taking pictures of us, rather than the statue, no doubt to capture our lily white children.  I love being a spectacle!  I hope our fine selves are plastered all over her holiday slideshows.

Bike tour

Now that we'd seen the town by sea, the next day it was time to see it by land via bicycle:

Every time I've ridden a bike in the past decade it's always been for tourist purposes.  But I've never had one of these awesome kid-carrying bikes before, which was highly entertaining for them.

We did a big loop around town, stopping at various playgrounds to entertain the kids.  Copenhagen playgrounds are bountiful and impressive.  Shout out to Max at Copenhagen Family Tours for hauling the 8 of us all around.

Would I rather look at historical artifacts and fancy royal things?  Yes I would, but I am simply not at that stage of life right now.  So we will continue to stop at 3 playgrounds per day on holiday for the foreseeable future, and return to the boring museums and tours full of grey hair [decades] into the future. 

There were also plenty of breaks for refreshments.

And of course we had to cycle ourselves back to the biggest (surprisingly small) thing in Copenhagen:

Crazy crowds there!  But you can get good photos if you walk down on the rocks right next to the water.  Far more impressive than this toddler-sized statue is located right next door:

Gefion Fountain

This fountain is big and beautiful and tells the tale of a Norse goddess who turned her 4 sons (OMG, that poor woman) into oxen.  It's a must visit if you're in the neighborhood to see the Little Mermaid, which you almost certainly will be.  It squirts water in just the right places to allow kids to soak themselves without being overly annoying to passersby.  

Which is precisely what you will also find on the Stroget walking street:

Pro travel parenting tip: find a fountain if you want some time to yourself.  After a disastrous dinner at the Torvehallerne food haul (OMG these kids do not sit and eat) we stumbled upon this water feature that is really not for kids to play in, but our little hellions took it upon themselves and had a ball.

They got soaked to their skin, and I have some hilarious pictures of Freya walking down the street in just her panties with a towel wrapped around her neck like a scarf.  I just know those photos will come in handy someday.

Fredriksborg Castle

The next day we headed out of town on the train to a castle, one of approximately 75,000 that seem to exist in tiny Denmark, as Pia found a blog post about how great and kid friendly it was.

Spoiler alert: it was not.  At least not for pram-aged kids, so hauling Fiona around was cumbersome.  Plus the costumes they let kids play with, literally the draw card to bring us there, were put away after a certain time that is not published or mentioned anywhere on the internet or in person.  What the hell?!

There was some nice architecture and artwork and stuff that would have been infinitely more enjoyable without kids.  But without these precious angels we wouldn't have made the decision to stop at the local mall to escape the rain and play in the various play areas:

While I may sound sarcastic (I assure you that is my intent) it was actually an interesting glimpse at real Denmark and Danish people, which was rather lacking in tourist-heavy central Copenhagen.  This was a little ways out of town in a suburban mall, so we very much got a peek at normal Danish life that we otherwise would not have seen.  I was so impressed with the free play areas (plural), so the day turned out to be much more kid friendly than a crusty old castle could provide.

As is our custom, we split the adults by gender and had one night out and one night home with the kids.  I let Pia plan whatever she wanted (on ladies night out and the trip as a whole, because we can theoretically go to Copenhagen whenever we please) and she wanted to go to a strictly Scandinavian restaurant, so we chose Restaurant Barr.

A place this popular requires reservations months in advance, so snagging a table felt like quite the feat.  A chic place like this adheres to the tenants of minimalism and Scandinavian design, one of them being not cooking their beef.

Beef tartare is so not my jam!  I'm a huge hypocrite, though, because if it was carpaccio I would've been all over it.  But Pia loved it, so I took one for the team and ate raw ground beef with flowers on top.  

The best part of the evening was finding a bar in the touristy, usually not-to-be-patronized Nyhavn neighborhood and drinking spiked hot chocolate until they closed down...at 2 a.m.!  

I haven't closed a bar down or been out that late in at least a decade, so that was a treat.  A successful mama's night out!

Rosenborg Castle

Would you believe it?  Another castle!  There are 15 working Danish royals and I swear they probably each have a handful of castles to their name. 

We didn't make it inside due to poor planning but the highlight for me was right outside, a pond full of big fish looking for a snack:

I will never not stop to look at fishes!

Tivoli Gardens

Almost as popular for tourists as the Little Mermaid statue is Tivoli, the third oldest amusement park in the world.  The oldest one is a short 30-minute train ride away and Ryan, a roller coaster superfan, went to that one on his own one morning to do what he does best.  The rest of us only went to this one, which really is a necessity for kids.  Freya rode her first roller coaster!

That face cracks me up as it accurately portrays her nervousness about the ride.  

Her reaction was very similar to mine when skydiving: terror before and during, followed by jubilation and a sense of accomplishment after the fact.  Brave girl!

Now that she's 4 she got to ride a few tame rides, while poor little Fiona...did not.

I took this kid leash from my sister as a joke, but it actually came in quite handy!  Don't hate on people who put their kid on a leash.  It's necessary sometimes!

Side note: how amazing are these matching Bluey outfits?!

These 4 Aussie citizen kids are forced to like Bluey whether they want to or not.  Not optional!

Sadly it was time for us to get back on the boat and head back to the rainy pathetic excuse of summer in Norway, while they were off to the sunny shores of Greece.

The boat ride back was similar to the boat ride there, except the weather was a million times worse so there was no more leisurely beer drinking out on the deck.

We had a fabulous trip which was 100% made possible by the fact that our friends have kids around(ish) the same age as ours.  Kids entertaining kids so the parents can enjoy themselves is nothing short of absolutely priceless!  I highly, highly recommend this tactic.  

I hate to jinx myself but when it comes to traveling I dare say we are getting our groove back.