Oktoberfest 2009

We had been thinking about going to the Oktoberfest for a long time, but we always put it off. This year the Canaletto Camper Club organised a small get-together among friends for the festival. Tina and I set off early on the 2nd, while the others, who had work commitments, left in the late afternoon; we were to meet at the Munich car park, the DE-Gasperi-Bogen, on Via De Gasperi. Once the details were in our trusty TomTom, we set off: buying the vignette to cross Austria and then mile after mile of motorway to Munich, with plenty of roadworks. We complain about Italy, but here it's worse. Arriving in Munich, still following the sat nav, we found ourselves out in open countryside and the little voice told me we had arrived. I realised I had got it all wrong: I had entered the coordinates using points instead of degrees.

I keyed in the right data and, crossing the whole of Munich, we reached the big car park: €35 per night, with all facilities and hot showers. I phoned Luigi to tell him where I was, but he was still in Italy and would arrive at night. In the morning I went looking for our friends and couldn't find them. I later learned they had arrived and left again for another car park; at the entrance they had been asked for €100 because there were more of them, a truly outrageous sum. As usual at these festivals they take advantage — he did well to leave, though he could have warned me. To get into the centre, right outside the car park there's a metro stop, the terminus of the U2; a ticket costing €8 valid all day for one to five people. You change at Innsbrucker station and take the U5, get off at Theresienwiese and you're at the entrance of the Oktoberfest.

In the morning it isn't too crowded yet, the stalls are open and you can wander freely; we took photos and around midday looked for somewhere to have lunch. We realised we should have booked, but we still found two seats in the company of some French people. Here too we got ripped off: two main courses with a side, a beer and a glass of wine: €52 — though we also paid for the show put on by the little band and by all the people dancing and singing. Leaving the festival enclosure there are several lawns where lots of young people are lying down — not to rest but to sleep off the drink; someone is unwell and is attended to by the assistance service, very active and ready when needed. In the afternoon, around 5, I go back to the campervan, taking the metro in the opposite direction, and reach the car park.