Get Ready For The 2010 Oktoberfest

By Author: Leura Zones
Total Articles: 38
Comment this article

You must have heard a lot about the Oktoberfest that is celebrated in Munich annually. Well, the time's again approaching and if you have not had the opportunity of attending one, the numerous cheap flights to Munich about this time should avail you the opportunity to attend this year's edition. If you are not familiar with the history of the history of the festival, let me fill you in briefly. It was originally started as an event meant to mark the marriage of Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese and its success prompted the repetition of the event the following year. It has been celebrated thereafter annually except for certain periods when it was cancelled for reasons of war, disease or other critical situations. As a matter of fact, the Oktoberfest celebrations have been cancelled 24 times since it first started.

This year's Oktoberfest celebrations will commence on the 18th of October, as usual, in Munich. If you are not resident in Munich or other parts of Germany, you can book a flight to the Munich International Airport and exploit the advantage of cheap flights to Munich ...
... I assure you that the festivities will be palpable right from the airport. I also advise you to be in Munich before the 18th as there will be competition for good seats. One of the thrills of attending the festival is to be able to compare holidays with friends. The festival officially kicks off when the Mayor of Munich taps the very first keg of the Oktoberfest beer and opens with the words "O'zapft is!" ("It's tapped!"), using the Austro-Bavarian language. After that, the Minister-President of Bavaria gets the first beer from the Mayor and the festivities kick off! The opening ceremony will take place in the Schottenhamel tent about noontime.

The next day is a Sunday, so the Oktoberfest costume parade will take place showing off the Costume and Riflemen's Parade. I wouldn't miss this for anything if I were you considering that it is very colorful and interesting. You'll also need to be there on time as the parade takes place in the morning. Oktoberfest is much more than mere guzzling of beer as there are so many other events taking place. You will have over 30 tents to choose from in order to have a fun-filled time. Oktoberfest has continually recorded a huge turnout annually, hitting 6.2 million visitors recently. This means that is you really wish to have fun, you might have to make reservations with the tents. This isn't hard to do; table reservations can be made via phone, mail or fax. This does not mean that you cannot visit a tent if you don't have a table reserved. You just have to time your visits to ensure that the crowd isn't much and this means that the ideal time for visits during the week would be any time before 2.00 p.m.

Oktoberfest may be a lot of fun when you and your friends compare holidays but then your kids could also have a great time there with the Ferris wheels, rollercoaster rides, assorted fun rides and various musical displays. If you wondering what the beer at the Oktoberfest costs, you can just join the debate. It varies from one year to another so I'll just use the rule of the thumbyou know, last year's prices. A liter of beer cost between 7.70 and 8 Euros during last year's Oktoberfest. So you can do the mathand the rest.