So I headed to Oktoberfest today with my neighbor Bernie.  I should have known Greg was going to bail on me when he said he would meet me there at 13:30.   The wether was perfect not too hot, not too cold, no rain and not too many people- just yet that is…  We got there and walked around before meeting the Munich International Ski Club with our Box section Hacker Tent.  The tents are amazing, huge and hold 9000 people.  It is crazy they take 2 months to build, 3 weeks of festivities and then another 2 months to take apart.  Over 8 million people will come to Munich and I think it is 6 million masses of beer and 3 million chickens are consumed in the 3 weeks of Oktoberfest.  We joined 80 of our closest ski buddies for Mass biers, 1/2 chickens, dancing and singing.  Greg finally shows up to make an appearance for 15 minutes and then said he was going on a quick walk and never came back.  Bernie joined me and we enjoyed the next 4 hours.  After feeling quite drunk we headed home so we can be productive at work tomorrow and not be too drunk. 

 

Let me give you a little history lesson on Oktoberfest-  Crown Prince Ludwig, later to become King Ludwig I, was married to Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen on 12 October 1810. The citizens of Munich were invited to attend the festivities held on the fields in front of the city gates to celebrate the happy royal event. The fields were renamed Theresienwiese ("Theres’a Fields") to honor the Crown Princess, although the locals have since abbreviated the name simply to "Wiesn". Horse races in the presence of the royal family marked the close of the event that was celebrated as a festival for the whole of Bavaria. The decision to repeat the horse races in subsequest years gave rise to the tradition of Oktoberfest.  In 1811, an added feature to the horse races was the first Agricultural Show, designed to boost Bavarian agriculture. The horse races, which were the oldest – and at one time – the most popular event of the festival are no longer held today. But the Agricultural Show is still held every three years during the Oktoberfest on the southern part of the festival grounds.  In the first few decades, the choices of amusements were sparse. In 1818, the first carousel and two swings were set up. Vistitors were able to quench their thirst at small beer stands, which grew rapidly in number. In 1896 the beer stands were replaced by the first beer tents and halls set up by the enterprising landlords with the backing of the breweries. The remainder of the festival site was taken up by a fun-fair. The range of carousels offered was already increasing rapidly in the 1870’s as the fairground trade continued to grow and develope in Germany.  Enough history… Here are a few pictures from the day.

 

Okay, so I am 6 months late on this entry.  With finally graduating from my MBA, I now have a life again.  So I am doing my blog catch up.  So over the winter holiday’s we had our annual Munich Holiday Party- this year we had about 45 packed into our tiny 3 room apartment.  We went through about 20 bottles of win and a case or two of beer.  Our crazy friends stayed till about 2:30AM and then headed out dancing till 6AM, crazy people!  The funniest was watching a bunch of expats (Spanish, British, Russian, Austrian, Croatian, Irish and Auzzies) and Germans trying to play Scene-IT with American Movies. 

 

After our party, Greg and I headed to Austria for Skiing and Snowboarding for the Christmas holiday.  Well, Greg’s great idea in saving money got us a pension that had lovely pictures on the bathroom showing us how to clean the toliet and shower. (I Know..)  Also, the conditions were so great that it rained almost all of the trip and the most fun was sledding down the 3.5KM sledding trail (which was a lot of fun!).  The town was cute and we spent most evenings at a pub listening to a dutch band seeing covers.  We became friends with a dutch family for some reason folks from Netherlands love Soell.  Here are a few pictures of the fun event…  I give Greg points for trying to schedule a great skiing holiday but the location and hotel were a little lack luster. 

 

In December we also headed out with the Munich International Ski Club on several trips.  Our favorite trip to Solden occurred first weekend in December and was brilliant.  Great snow, gondola walking distance from our pension.  Our pension with sauna and great breakfast.  We also headed to Austria for several day trips that were fantastic.  The Alps are great over the winter!

 

 

Well we are in middle of the summer in Munich.  As you can see from pictures below and in the photo album life is real tough.  We head to the English Garden for frisbee, scrabble, reading in the sun or sitting having a beer in the biergarten.  We head down to the Isar and enjoy some drinks at the Strand Bar.   We take a nice 55km bike ride around Starnberg See and a dip in the lake.  There are lovely outdoor concerts- we saw Eric Clapton, the Germans were a little too nervous to stand-up and dance until the very last song.  Come on over and visit and have a beer and watch the people in the park.