Major Mom 
Made it to our first UK destination — Exeter! Home of the UK Meteorology Office!
After landing at London Heathrow, Dave and I had to take a brief train east into central London, then west about 2.5 hours to get here.
We are beat but are forcing ourselves to stay awake till an early bedtime. Just a few more hours to go.
Dave and I got home last evening, ready to sleep Tuesday night. Hopefully my jet lag is mostly cured from that. All of our souvenirs made it home unscathed, including 3 glass mugs, a bottle of “salt mine” gin, and a 6-pack of 0.5L beer for our dog sitters. We purposefully left space in our luggage to bring back some glassware.
As promised, now that my mind is clear, here are some random tips/facts from our experience. This is a long one, but hopefully it answers some of the questions we’ve been getting from folks who are heading over in the coming couple of weeks. The first 5 points are most specific to our choice of using a travel agent, the rest are more generic.
Our last full day in Germany. We took a tour — included in our Oktoberfest package — of several sites in the Obersalzburg region, about 2 hours east of Munich right on the Austrian border. In fact, we did cross the border a couple times into Austria. Technically, we visited sites south of Salzburg, Austria…but we were still in Germany.
Our 2nd day at Oktoberfest. We started by watching the Hunters and Costume parade, which is a very long, very large parade that continued throughout the Oktoberfest grounds through midday. It went right in front of our hotel, which made it easy to relax at the hotel’s outdoor seating area. We didn’t watch for long…we made our way back to the grounds and the parade was heading that way too.
Folks who knew me from my youth might remember that my absolute favorite ride at Busch Gardens Williamsburg growing up was the giant spinning swing in the Germany section.
Did you know about 1/2 of the Oktoberfest grounds is a carnival that would rival most state fairs? I mean, imagine our state fairs with German engineering! Imagine my excitement seeing that Oktoberfest has a 90 meter tall swingset!! (Actually there are two of them — there are multiples of many of the most popular rides). The one we rode was called the “Kettenflieger Bayern Tower.” (Kettenflieger translates to “chair-o-planes”.)
Yesterday (Saturday) was the opening day for Munich’s Oktoberfest. It opens with a parade that takes the kegs of beer, via horse-drawn wagon, through the streets of Munich, to be delivered to their respective beer tents on the Oktoberfest grounds.
After the parade, at noon, the first keg is tapped by the mayor of Munich. That officially opens the beer service at the event. At our hotel, the manager hosted a beer tapping at noon for the hotel guests. Free beer, yay!
We had a 2:30-5:30pm reservation at the Marstall tent, which featured Spaaten beer. We enjoyed food and beer and so much music. Afterwards we walked around the Oktoberfest grounds some and met up with Air Force friends who were just wrapping up a week of training down the road in Oberammergau and made it to the Wiesn for the evening. The day ended with the Bayern Tower ride.
It was a long day but Dave and I had the best time. And OMG so. much. beer… #oktoberfest? #oktoberfest2024 #oktoberfestmünchen
This was a welcome dinner for everyone here for Oktoberfest? opening weekend with our Tour Group from Bucket List Event.
We took up most of this part of the beer hall. Met some great folks Friday evening. The wienerschnitzel was delicious.
The kegs tap at noon Saturday!
#oktoberfestmunich #oktoberfest2024
Thanks to jet lag messing up our eating schedule, and knowing that our tour package will ramp up the Bavarian meals starting Friday, we opted for an inexpensive “fast food” dinner Thursday night: we are about 1/2 km from the Munich Hauptbahnhof (the main train station) so we found a stand that sold lavash flatbread wraps and sat on a bench to watch the busy train traffic for a while.
Then we wandered back to the hotel, stopping at a “EuroShop”, the equivalent of a Dollar General. That was an…experience. #oktoberfest? #daves50th
On to happier stories. We found the birthday boy a real live German model train store! This is right outside the Munich Hauptbahnhof…
This has to be the most pristine model train store I have ever seen in my life (and I have seen MANY…).
