Ocktoberfest!
Looking to use some hotel certificates in hand, I was prompted with the idea of a trip to Germany. Ocktoberfest seemed like a good idea and blazed off to Munich. A couple of firsts for me on this trip. I've never flown on Lufthansa and never been to Germany which is also the most east I have travelled on this globe.
At LAX, I normally don't fly out of Tom Bradley International terminal and was pleasantly surprised how nice it was inside. I stopped over at the Star Alliance lounge in the terminal and I think it is one of the nicest lounges at LAX. I'm always a sucker for free booze and the food was filling. There was chicken fried rice and ready-made ramen bowls to be had. Definite asian influence around here.... :)
This is also my first time flying on an Airbus 340-600. I'm assuming it is the counterpart to the Boeing 747 planes. The plane overall felt cramp and I'm convinced that Germans must like really warm weather. I'm not prone to being hot too often but the flight was uncomfortably warm where I was sitting at in the plane and planes are usually freezing! It was so warm that the chocolate bars I had with me on my tray table melted inside the packaging without me touching them! The plane isn't equipped with individual vents and the flight attendants didn't seem to know how to get the plane cooler as the whole plane was controlled by one system. When I did go to the restrooms, I did find that the back of the plane was cooler than the front, so if you ever assign yourself a seat, you might want to consider the back of the plane. Another thing was the restrooms were huge (for airplane bathrooms) and it was "downstairs." The restrooms are placed in the lower part of the airplane and you walk down the stairs in the middle of the plane to access them. I did like the service on the flight as I was able to get two free meals and as much alcohol that I could take. They don't give you the little taste bottles, they had the big bottles and poured directly into a cup. Good stuff!
Did a quick layover in Frankfurt Airport before getting into Munich Airport. It took almost an hour to walk from the international terminal to the domestic terminal to catch the connecting flight. I think I walked two miles in the airport, it was that large. I don't know what I was expecting at Frankfurt but it isn't an efficient airport. Surprising since Germans are known for their efficiency, right? The customs was confusing if you were trying to stay in the airport. The Lufthansa Business Lounge was a nice reprieve from all the trampsing around I did in the airport. More free alchohol and I'm not even at my destination yet!
The Munich airport is a lot easier to navigate. Both airports are highly commercialized, so you can definitely do some shopping if you wanted to. To get to the city center, I caught the S-bahn train at the airport. The station is outside of the airport but still connected to the airport. There is a lovely plaza in between the airport entrance and the train station. Audi is a big sponsor as I walked through and saw all the Audi displays. They have a forum museum in the Munich airport plaza. A word to Bank of America customers, they have an agreement with Deutsche Bank and you can withdraw from the ATM fee free. There are a number of the Deutsche Bank ATMS in the city center. (The ATM fee should not be confused with currency conversion fees which ALWAYS applies.)
The public transportation system, MVV, in Munich seems well designed. If travelling in groups, there are ticket passes for up to five adults. If you're travelling with kids, two kids (under 14) counts as one adult. It really is a great deal.
Checked into the Hilton Munich City Hotel and crashed in the Executive Lounge for a little bit before freshening up. This being Ocktoberfest, hotel rooms are scarce (at least in the reasonable price range). I'm glad to be using these certificates as I think the hotel rooms were going for over 400 euros a night! Yikes!! The hotel sits on top of the Rosenheimer Platz station making it easy to navigate the city via public transportation and relatively close to the city center. I also ended up grabbing some appetizers and cocktails in the lobby bar restaurant, Metropolis Bar. I usually find hotel lobby bars a bit pricy and the food bland. In this case, I loved the chicken wings and potato wedges in this place. If I lived in Munich, I would go here for happy hour anytime.
With the time zone difference, I wasn't able to get up and ready until noon the next day. Strolled through the city center and take in the city vibe. A very clean and green city, the weather was really pleasant for October (ranging from 60s in the day and 40s at night). I'm actually surprised to see the Germans bundled up in jackets as I was hot off and on throughout the day. Whenever I strolled into a store, the heat inside was too much for me that I was constantly holding my jacket in my arms and needed to leave to get some fresh air. Grabbed lunch at McDonald's. There is a lot of pork in German food and the local McDonald's menu reflected the German taste. I had to grab a fried apple pie and a McRib. Here in Munich, the McRib is on the permanent menu. My two favorite McDonald items in one spot! I just had to travel 7000 miles to do it. :)
Saw the gardens and architectural buildings in the city after having lunch. I'm really impressed with the design and layout of the city. The combined pedestrian, bicycling and cars in the roadways. I was reminded of Amsterdam except bigger and no canals. It was also cool to see the streets chockful of Mercedes Benz, BMW, Audis, VW and Porsches. And the wagon style seems like a really popular choice here. It was interesting to see such old buildings renovated for today's environment of retail and commercial needs. Also, alot of the Germans were walking around in traditional garb in the city. I was tempted to buy the female version in the local stores for Halloween!
While trampsing around the city near Marien Platz, made a pit stop at Hofbrauhaus. The Vegas location is similar except that it is half the size of the original. It also seemed to be constantly busy, the place was a madhouse and I was able to grab a stein of beer as well as some souvenirs. It was interesting to see how many Americans and Australians were around. The beer wagon cart outside was also interesting to see, the horses even had their own "hats" and "coats".
Came back to the Hilton at the end of the day and grabbed a power nap. Instead of heading out, stayed at the Executive Lounge and hung out with other guests meeting people from Wisconsin, North Carolina, and London! Apparently Americans were showing up full force for Ocktoberfest. :) It was easy to stay in the Lounge for the evening as there were plenty of snacks to eat and an open bar giving little incentive to find the nightlife in Munich.
The next day switched hotels to the Four Points by Sheraton Munchen Olympiapark. With the hotel certificates used up, I decided to use my Starwood points and spend some time at another hotel chain. Unfortunately, the only Starwood property that would let me stay for two nights on points was this one which is further from the city center and is in the Olympic grounds when it was in Munich in 1972. I've never stayed in facilities that once was built for the Olympics so it was interesting to see how the area was designed and how they built the facilities for that time period. The area has been converted to residential housing with some stores and restaurants at the ground floor. The BMW factory plant/museum is also located in the same area. The hotel seems a little small, more in line with what I expect of European hotels and it is a Four Points as well. Certainly different from the Hilton. Wired internet is available for free. For internet lovers, I have found that at both hotels, the internet speed is slower than I'm used to in American hotels.
Spent the afternoon wandering the grounds of Ocktoberfest. It took about 2 hours to just walk around and look at everything. Since I didn't have a tent reservation, I contented myself with watching the throngs of people walking around, drinking and eating. The actual festival reminded me of the LA County Fair meets Magic Mountain with a beer theme. I think that is the closest description I can give for the place. Of some interest, if you buy water bottles to drink, they tack on an euro as a deposit for the bottle. If you go back to the vendor and give them your bottle, they will give you back the euro. A good thing since I was confused how a little 20 oz bottle of water could cost 3.5 euros. Also, at our Four Points hotel, there is a small retail plaza at the ground floor with a supermarket. After buying a liter of water, I found that there was a recycling machine in the back of the store. Bottle redemptions is 0.25 Euro for the big ones and 0.15 Euro for the small ones. That's pretty steep given that I'm used to 10 cent and 5 cent redemptions in the state.
Afterwards, headed back to Marienplatz for souvenir shopping and headed back to the hotel to catch some US college football on the internet. :) I later found out that gummi bears and cuckoo clocks are of German origin.
In the last day, went to the souvenir shop at the Deutsche Museum and then wandered over to the Deutsche Museum Verkehrszentrum to check out all vehicles from back in the day to future vehicles. All the museums are spread throughout the city so be prepared to jump onto the subway to get to another museum. Grabbed a late lunch at Altes Hackerbrau which inside a restored brewery turned hotel, having some schnitzel and roast pork. I'm not a fan of german dumplings but their pork dishes are really good. Afterwards, briefly went to the BMW Museum for some souvenirs. Walked around and saw the latest and greatest BMWs, it was nice and would be tempting if I liked BMWs. Since the plant is next door, this is where people come to pick up their "German-made" BMW to bring back to their home country.
I had dinner at Weisses Brauhaus with some friends who came over to Munich as part of their European vacation. They knew someone who lives in Munich and the restaurant recommendation came from the local person. It was a pleasant surprise to find out friends from the States were in the area and have some beer, more roast pork, and some Zwetschgenbavese (fried plum jam toast dessert thing) before heading back home. I mostly had pork, sausage, and beer in Munich so you can take this with a grain of salt but I will say the food is really good.
At LAX, I normally don't fly out of Tom Bradley International terminal and was pleasantly surprised how nice it was inside. I stopped over at the Star Alliance lounge in the terminal and I think it is one of the nicest lounges at LAX. I'm always a sucker for free booze and the food was filling. There was chicken fried rice and ready-made ramen bowls to be had. Definite asian influence around here.... :)
This is also my first time flying on an Airbus 340-600. I'm assuming it is the counterpart to the Boeing 747 planes. The plane overall felt cramp and I'm convinced that Germans must like really warm weather. I'm not prone to being hot too often but the flight was uncomfortably warm where I was sitting at in the plane and planes are usually freezing! It was so warm that the chocolate bars I had with me on my tray table melted inside the packaging without me touching them! The plane isn't equipped with individual vents and the flight attendants didn't seem to know how to get the plane cooler as the whole plane was controlled by one system. When I did go to the restrooms, I did find that the back of the plane was cooler than the front, so if you ever assign yourself a seat, you might want to consider the back of the plane. Another thing was the restrooms were huge (for airplane bathrooms) and it was "downstairs." The restrooms are placed in the lower part of the airplane and you walk down the stairs in the middle of the plane to access them. I did like the service on the flight as I was able to get two free meals and as much alcohol that I could take. They don't give you the little taste bottles, they had the big bottles and poured directly into a cup. Good stuff!
Did a quick layover in Frankfurt Airport before getting into Munich Airport. It took almost an hour to walk from the international terminal to the domestic terminal to catch the connecting flight. I think I walked two miles in the airport, it was that large. I don't know what I was expecting at Frankfurt but it isn't an efficient airport. Surprising since Germans are known for their efficiency, right? The customs was confusing if you were trying to stay in the airport. The Lufthansa Business Lounge was a nice reprieve from all the trampsing around I did in the airport. More free alchohol and I'm not even at my destination yet!
The Munich airport is a lot easier to navigate. Both airports are highly commercialized, so you can definitely do some shopping if you wanted to. To get to the city center, I caught the S-bahn train at the airport. The station is outside of the airport but still connected to the airport. There is a lovely plaza in between the airport entrance and the train station. Audi is a big sponsor as I walked through and saw all the Audi displays. They have a forum museum in the Munich airport plaza. A word to Bank of America customers, they have an agreement with Deutsche Bank and you can withdraw from the ATM fee free. There are a number of the Deutsche Bank ATMS in the city center. (The ATM fee should not be confused with currency conversion fees which ALWAYS applies.)
The public transportation system, MVV, in Munich seems well designed. If travelling in groups, there are ticket passes for up to five adults. If you're travelling with kids, two kids (under 14) counts as one adult. It really is a great deal.
Checked into the Hilton Munich City Hotel and crashed in the Executive Lounge for a little bit before freshening up. This being Ocktoberfest, hotel rooms are scarce (at least in the reasonable price range). I'm glad to be using these certificates as I think the hotel rooms were going for over 400 euros a night! Yikes!! The hotel sits on top of the Rosenheimer Platz station making it easy to navigate the city via public transportation and relatively close to the city center. I also ended up grabbing some appetizers and cocktails in the lobby bar restaurant, Metropolis Bar. I usually find hotel lobby bars a bit pricy and the food bland. In this case, I loved the chicken wings and potato wedges in this place. If I lived in Munich, I would go here for happy hour anytime.
With the time zone difference, I wasn't able to get up and ready until noon the next day. Strolled through the city center and take in the city vibe. A very clean and green city, the weather was really pleasant for October (ranging from 60s in the day and 40s at night). I'm actually surprised to see the Germans bundled up in jackets as I was hot off and on throughout the day. Whenever I strolled into a store, the heat inside was too much for me that I was constantly holding my jacket in my arms and needed to leave to get some fresh air. Grabbed lunch at McDonald's. There is a lot of pork in German food and the local McDonald's menu reflected the German taste. I had to grab a fried apple pie and a McRib. Here in Munich, the McRib is on the permanent menu. My two favorite McDonald items in one spot! I just had to travel 7000 miles to do it. :)
Saw the gardens and architectural buildings in the city after having lunch. I'm really impressed with the design and layout of the city. The combined pedestrian, bicycling and cars in the roadways. I was reminded of Amsterdam except bigger and no canals. It was also cool to see the streets chockful of Mercedes Benz, BMW, Audis, VW and Porsches. And the wagon style seems like a really popular choice here. It was interesting to see such old buildings renovated for today's environment of retail and commercial needs. Also, alot of the Germans were walking around in traditional garb in the city. I was tempted to buy the female version in the local stores for Halloween!
While trampsing around the city near Marien Platz, made a pit stop at Hofbrauhaus. The Vegas location is similar except that it is half the size of the original. It also seemed to be constantly busy, the place was a madhouse and I was able to grab a stein of beer as well as some souvenirs. It was interesting to see how many Americans and Australians were around. The beer wagon cart outside was also interesting to see, the horses even had their own "hats" and "coats".
Came back to the Hilton at the end of the day and grabbed a power nap. Instead of heading out, stayed at the Executive Lounge and hung out with other guests meeting people from Wisconsin, North Carolina, and London! Apparently Americans were showing up full force for Ocktoberfest. :) It was easy to stay in the Lounge for the evening as there were plenty of snacks to eat and an open bar giving little incentive to find the nightlife in Munich.
The next day switched hotels to the Four Points by Sheraton Munchen Olympiapark. With the hotel certificates used up, I decided to use my Starwood points and spend some time at another hotel chain. Unfortunately, the only Starwood property that would let me stay for two nights on points was this one which is further from the city center and is in the Olympic grounds when it was in Munich in 1972. I've never stayed in facilities that once was built for the Olympics so it was interesting to see how the area was designed and how they built the facilities for that time period. The area has been converted to residential housing with some stores and restaurants at the ground floor. The BMW factory plant/museum is also located in the same area. The hotel seems a little small, more in line with what I expect of European hotels and it is a Four Points as well. Certainly different from the Hilton. Wired internet is available for free. For internet lovers, I have found that at both hotels, the internet speed is slower than I'm used to in American hotels.
Spent the afternoon wandering the grounds of Ocktoberfest. It took about 2 hours to just walk around and look at everything. Since I didn't have a tent reservation, I contented myself with watching the throngs of people walking around, drinking and eating. The actual festival reminded me of the LA County Fair meets Magic Mountain with a beer theme. I think that is the closest description I can give for the place. Of some interest, if you buy water bottles to drink, they tack on an euro as a deposit for the bottle. If you go back to the vendor and give them your bottle, they will give you back the euro. A good thing since I was confused how a little 20 oz bottle of water could cost 3.5 euros. Also, at our Four Points hotel, there is a small retail plaza at the ground floor with a supermarket. After buying a liter of water, I found that there was a recycling machine in the back of the store. Bottle redemptions is 0.25 Euro for the big ones and 0.15 Euro for the small ones. That's pretty steep given that I'm used to 10 cent and 5 cent redemptions in the state.
Afterwards, headed back to Marienplatz for souvenir shopping and headed back to the hotel to catch some US college football on the internet. :) I later found out that gummi bears and cuckoo clocks are of German origin.
In the last day, went to the souvenir shop at the Deutsche Museum and then wandered over to the Deutsche Museum Verkehrszentrum to check out all vehicles from back in the day to future vehicles. All the museums are spread throughout the city so be prepared to jump onto the subway to get to another museum. Grabbed a late lunch at Altes Hackerbrau which inside a restored brewery turned hotel, having some schnitzel and roast pork. I'm not a fan of german dumplings but their pork dishes are really good. Afterwards, briefly went to the BMW Museum for some souvenirs. Walked around and saw the latest and greatest BMWs, it was nice and would be tempting if I liked BMWs. Since the plant is next door, this is where people come to pick up their "German-made" BMW to bring back to their home country.
I had dinner at Weisses Brauhaus with some friends who came over to Munich as part of their European vacation. They knew someone who lives in Munich and the restaurant recommendation came from the local person. It was a pleasant surprise to find out friends from the States were in the area and have some beer, more roast pork, and some Zwetschgenbavese (fried plum jam toast dessert thing) before heading back home. I mostly had pork, sausage, and beer in Munich so you can take this with a grain of salt but I will say the food is really good.
Comments