Prost!

Cheers! to another year of Oktoberfest events all around the world. This year I traveled to 3 different Oktoberfests to experience the Bavarian culture at its finest: Helen Georgia’s Oktoberfest, Stuttgart’s Canstatter Volksfest, and the big kahuna in München. While I was over in Europe I also got to pop into the Alps for a few days and took advantage of beautiful 360° views everywhere you look. But first: beer.

If you live within driving distance of North Georgia, a trip to Helen is worth the drive. Helen is a small town nestled between the Appalachian mountains and every building in town is built to look like traditional southern German architecture. Yes, even the Dollar General. They celebrate Oktoberfest for two months (!) every September and October as a town-wide festival. Dirndl’s and Lederhosen are common dress, pretzels are available on every block, and beer is sold at a discount at every bar in town if you carry around your plastic 32oz mug (which comes free with your first 32oz beer). Plus, if you come early enough in September you can still tube down the Chattahoochee river.

Over in Stuttgart Germany, I was able to visit the Canstatter Volksfest with my wife Jordan and our friends Kelly, Lizzie, and Justin who we were traveling through Europe with. The Volksfest felt a lot like a huge state fair: large rides of questionable safety (which I rode of course), food worthy of clogging your largest arteries (which I ate of course), and drinks available at many booths throughout the event (which I drank of course). The rides were fun, but surprisingly most of them were spinning rides. This plus copious amounts of beer didn’t seem like a great combination. I was there on a Saturday night and it still wasn’t a problem to find tables at the outdoor beer gardens and the lines for the rides were pretty short. Plus plenty of the traditional outfits! All around a solid event.

Then there’s the original. The München Wiesn, the largest in the world, the Munich Oktoberfest, and it was absolutely packed. A lot of the same things in Munich were also in Stuttgart: the beer, the rides, the clothes, and the food, but it seems almost incorrect to call the beer tents, “tents” as they are massive temporary buildings holding thousands of people. And there are tons of them! The biggest problem with Oktoberfest is honestly the accessibility of beer. At the Volksfest, beer was available for purchase at many stands around the festival. At Oktoberfest, we only found one place that would even sell beer to you unless you were inside a beer tent and had your own seat at a table, although there were a few stands that would sell mixed drinks and shots. When ~7.3 million people visited this year, that’s a hard task to get some beer.

But being the largest and original of the Oktoberfests, there’s an expectation to be crowded and popular like any tourist attraction. Make sure you take a long walk around the entire festival to see everything there is to offer. And if you want a seat in the beer tents, a high percentage of tables are reserved in advance (for a fee) so if that isn’t you, make sure to arrive early and claim one of the tables set aside for first-come-first-served. And plan to stay as long as you can. If you leave, you probably won’t get a table back again (or at another tent). And while we didn’t stay all night, it does appear that if you camp at the first-come tables all day long, you can stay all night too, even after the main evening reservations begin at 6pm. Your results will vary. At Wiesn, almost every single person was wearing a dirndl or lederhosen and it honestly felt awesome to be in cool outfits with everyone else there. A good time was had in Munich and since there are still many things I’d like to do there (including go back for Oktoberfest round 2), I’m sure I’ll be back. Now off to the Alps!

Part of the European adventure this trip included seeing the massive and beautiful Alps mountain range. My first stop: the Zugspitze, the tallest point in Germany. After a night in the cute town(s?) of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, my friends and I grabbed the morning train up toward the mountain. We passed the alpine lake of Eibsee and begun our steep ascent through a nearly 5km tunnel up the mountain on our cog wheel train. After what seemed like forever underground we popped out at the glacier just underneath the tallest peak to walk around and see the beautiful views. One short cable car more and we arrived at the sleek modern building at the top of the mountain, right next to the golden cross. See, this golden cross was originally brought to the highest point in Germany by a religious expedition which wanted Germany’s highest peak to be adorned and crowned with holy significance. The original cross was removed due to wear and tear (partly from being used as bombing target practice in WW2), but the 14ft replica is true to the original and still stands on the summit today. Kelly and I took the short (but steep) ladder and cables to get to the cross and be the tallest people in Germany for a brief moment. One larger cable car took us back down the mountain to the alpine lake where we caught the train toward our next destination: Austria.

Jordan and her sister studied abroad in college in Innsbruck, Austria, and after hearing so many stories about their time, I wanted to see it for myself. So as the opportunity to be nearby in Munich presented itself, I knew we had to go. The small mountain town I imagined happened to be a quite large city instead, even having hosted some winter Olympic events multiple times in the past. What is truly curious though is the color of the river Inn which runs through the city center. It’s a very milky color, almost a greenish blueish tealish, hard to describe color. But just sitting by the river in this city surrounded by the Alps was so pleasant, and after the warmth in Munich, the cool air made it feel like the fall weather we expected. While in Innsbruck we visited an old friend of Jordan’s, ate at one of her favorite Nepalese restaurants, and got some drinks at a bar she enjoyed. We also got to tour the Innsbruck Imperial Palace with its lavish interior and ornate rooms. Jordan and I even had a short dance in the palace ballroom.

Just as soon as we arrived, it felt like we already had to leave since we packed so much into a short trip. But a quick stop in a new country was on the horizon: Liechtenstein. Our sole stop in the small nation was to the wine cellars of the Prince of Liechtenstein in Vaduz. The adjoining vineyard sat directly toward the Vaduz castle making for some incredible views. And while we didn’t have time for an official tour and tasting, the five of us did a bit of a “pick something you like and we will all trade” tasting of our own, and the wine did not disappoint.

After seeing the sheep between the vines, we grabbed a few cases to go and headed off to Switzerland. Another new country for us all (except Justin), we grabbed some Swiss Franc’s from the ATM and headed toward Appenzell. The night would be spent on the side of a mountain, so we took the cable car up instead of the steep hike (naturally) and had an unexpectedly amazing meal. The evening was peaceful with an incredible sunset (and alpenglow), the soft sounds of cowbells from the valley below, and the stars coming out in full force. Peaceful until I kept getting destroyed in Uno that is…

But to wrap up a long blog post, yes, this trip was only 9 days, and yes, maybe we did too much. But everything we did was so interesting and cool that it was worth the effort. Although we will (hopefully) remember this lesson next time we plan a big trip! And while you won’t find many photos from our beer drinking adventures in the gallery, the Alps gallery is live NOW, right here on journeywithryan.com and as always I’ll be posting the highlights on my instagram, @journeywithryan. And forgive me that it will still be a couple weeks until I can edit and upload the video. Now I’m off to another adventure, I’ll see you there!

-Ryan