We arrived last Thursday and had a few beers at the hostel. Then some food in the Augustiner brewery restaurant (Would recommend that you check this restaurant out if you ever go – also they keep the beautiful black horses that you will see at the festival in the stables right beside it. They even have a window so you can see them while you are eating!) and then off to the tents. Of course the tents were very busy, so we didn’t manage to get a seat – and the only way to get served is to have a seat. So we wandered down to the Paulener tent and sat outside – And the first Maß round was bought. How cool are Steins? Very! We joked about how boring pubs back home were going to be when we couldn’t bang our drinks off the table(and no spillage or breakage!) and sing hilariously loud songs! Anyway, just after the first round was bought, one member of our group headed for the toilet and promptly broke his arm! He slipped and fell and snapped the bone in the upper part of your arm and had to be rushed to hospital in an ambulance, and that unfortunately was the end of his Oktoberfest as he spent the rest of the trip in a bed in hospital.

The hostel we stayed in was The Meinenger hostel just about a 2 minute walk from where the tents are and was a really good place to stay. The bar they had didn’t seem to have a closing time and a number of night we’re pretty sure we saw dawn the next morning! Great fun was had by all in this hostel, and would recommend it if your going with a group of lads. TV’s in the rooms, comfortable beds and friendly staff make this the best hostel I’ve ever stayed in. It was a little on the expensive side – €200 for the 4 nights including breakfast but being so close to Oktoberfest probably warrants that.

I’ve been to Munich before and found it one of my favorite cities to visit. Its very tourist friendly and the people are always nice. I was there last year for their Christmas market with my lovely girlfriend and it was amazing. I stayed in the Arabella Sheraton Bogenhausen, which was a little expensive but very luxurious and perfect for a weekend break with your partner. This trip on helped that view as again I found the bavarian locals as very friendly and helpful. Even the police were ultra friendly (unless of course you’ve done something wrong and then you can expect a world of efficient pain!). It has loads to do, and one of those things that I’d recommend is a trip to Dachau concentration camp. It’s an eerie place, that teaches you a lot about what went on. Myself and my girlfriend went at the end of our trip and we recommend you do that unless it taints your view of the people you meet on the rest of your trip. The people that committed those crimes can never really be forgiven but its in the past and I really wouldn’t want it to taint your view of modern Munich as a beautiful friendly city. It can never really escape its history but can be proud of the city that it has become. All in all, I can recommend Munich as perfect for a weekend trip with the lads or the partner.

Another first for me was sleeping in a sleeping bag in a bed… Because of the mosquitoes. Or “Mozzies” as they were affectionately called. Before coming to Kenya I’d loaded up on every wives tale there was. Ate loads of carrots, took vitamin B, C and any other I could find. I bought industrial amounts of insect repellent too. The room’s their apartments didn’t have any netting and they weren’t about to buy any when a cheap sleeping bag would do the trick! So before getting into bed the bag was liberally sprayed with insect repellent.

The next morning I woke half expecting to have been eaten alive by the Mozzies but to my surprise I wasn’t touched at all. So there ya go. Sleeping in a sleeping bag stopped the little fellas. I learnt from the girls that on the first few nights they were bitten quite a few times and that one of them came up with the sleeping bag thing by mistake. But it worked for them so they all used it.

I was excited to get out and about, but the girls having been here for a while couldn’t stand my early morning enthusiasm! So I sat down to get some research done and to take a look through the local paper that was on the table to see what was going on in this part of the world…

Well, it was certainly interesting. Corruption committees, the complete application list of 900 people for 20 jobs, and talk of the world cup. One of the most interesting though was a report for a teacher union election meeting. Now in most places I can say with confidence that this probably would be a boring affair that might get a column inch. Here though, during the balloting there had been a bit of name calling which turned into a fight which turned into the main groups of supporters launching the furniture and whatever else at each other. The police were called and then when they couldn’t restore order with baton charges, the army arrived and settled the dispute with tear gas. This would have been headline news back home. In fact it would have created such a media storm that it wouldn’t have been out of the papers for about a week. This article however, only took up the bottom third of the page, and was on page 9.

<< Part 2