Oktoberfest in Germany 2022

This year we were lucky enough to check another item off the bucket list. A huge group of us traveled to Munich, Germany for Oktoberfest and it was an unforgettable experience! There were 16 of us in total, most coming from the United States, but 2 coming from the Netherlands. We all arrived in Munich on a Monday and stayed at Hotel Marc Munchen because it was close to the festival grounds. The first night's dinner was at Steinheil 16, where I think we took up the majority of the restaurant! We left an American-sized tip on our large bill, so the waiter brought out free Jager shots to show his appreciation. Ha! 

Dinner with friends is fun, but dinner with a ton of your friends, on vacation in Germany, is even more fun! After dinner we headed to Boilerman Bar, where we ended up taking over the piano and singing some Elton John and Billy Joel for the rest of the patrons. Americans...we're an entitled bunch, aren't we??

Tuesday was our first day at Oktoberfest and the weather started out beautifully. We posed for a lot of pictures to capture the moment, since all 16 of us were dressed in traditional Bavarian costumes!

We had tent reservations at Schutzen-Festzelt for lunchtime. "Tent" is a misleading word because they're actually very large, fully-enclosed buildings with everything you need to enjoy yourselves. 

The reservation came with dedicated seating for all of us, a meal, and 2 beers each. The first couple hours of our time block were spent eating and drinking in a relatively calm environment. As the hours passed, and the tent filled up and people consumed more alcohol, the band started playing more upbeat songs and the crowd got into it! We stood on our benches, danced and sang, and that's when it felt like the Oktoberfest you'd imagine.

After 4 hours, they kicked everyone out, so we walked around the festival grounds. It reminded me of our State Fair here in Texas. There were carnival rides, games, souvenir shops, snacks, etc. There are also tons of other tents, so we decided to check out the famous Hofbrau one. We didn't have reservations, so we had to find room wherever we could fit and it was standing room only. It was packed and definitely high energy! 

By that time, the weather had taken a turn for the worse, so we decided to leave the grounds and look for a dinner option. A few of us ended up at Munchner Stubn, which was right around the corner from our hotel. (We actually ate there 3 times during our entire stay in Munich!). It had been a long day, so we called it a night after that.

The next (dreary) day in Munich was spent doing some sight-seeing and shopping around the Marienplatz, where we saw a performance by the Glockenspiel. The whole group had lunch at Ratskeller before we split off so some could go back to Oktoberfest, some left to return to the Netherlands, and some returned to the hotel to rest and regroup. That night, a few of us went to dinner at La Burrita because we were craving comfort Mexican food! You never know what to expect when you try to eat Mexican food in Western Europe, but we were pleasantly surprised by how good the food and drinks were. We ended the night back at Munchner Stubn for dessert and were entertained by some of the restaurant patrons thinking they were still at Oktoberfest and trying to get everyone to join them in song.

The next morning we had a flight to Dublin, where we spent one more night before returning to the US. This trip was definitely one we'll never forget. Being able to share this experience with so many of our friends was priceless. Auf Wiedersehen, Germany! I'll be back soon.

Dublin and Northern Ireland 2022

The first destination of our Europe trip this year was Dublin, Ireland. Joining us was my sister and her husband and two great friends, Scott & Kyle. We rented a car, which was an adventure in itself. Thank goodness we got an automatic, so as not to make it even harder on ourselves. Ireland drives on the left side of the road, so the driver sits on the right side of the vehicle. The lanes are so small and there are tons of walkers and bikers to look out for. Meezy and I took turns with the driving responsibilities, but everyone in the car was on "look out" duty no matter who was driving, lol.

We stayed at the Royal Marine Hotel, which is situated on the coast of Dublin Bay, about 30 minutes south of the city center. The hotel was nice with good parking, shops and restaurants nearby, and beautiful views, but if I was going back, I'd choose a hotel closer to the city. It was a bit of a drag having to drive that distance before and after each day's activities.  

After resting at our hotel for a little bit, we headed into Dublin for a guided tour at the Jameson Distillery. I couldn't care less about alcohol, but of course I was going to be a good sport and participate in everything. The tour was actually fantastic and we had an awesome tour guide. We added on a private cask draw experience, which included a tasting directly from a barrel. Then we finished up with a drink at their bar. 

I'd recommend the tour even if you don't love Jameson, or alcohol in general. The facility is very cool and we all enjoyed the experience. Afterward we headed to Token for dinner. They have ample vegetarian and vegan options and cheap, old-school arcade games to play after you're done eating. Not wanting to call it a night just yet, we then walked over to The Brazen Head, Ireland's oldest pub. It had live music, so we felt like we were getting the authentic Irish pub experience!  

Day Two started with a visit to Trinity College, where we learned about and saw the Book of Kells (no pics allowed) and got to tour the Long Room. This is the main chamber of the Old Library, built in the 1700s, which is filled with 200,000 of the oldest books from Britain and Ireland. It's stunning! They are closing in October 2023 for a 3-year renovation, so we feel lucky we got to see it while we could.

After the library, we hit up some tourist attractions around Dublin - Ha'Penny Bridge, Temple Bar District, and Dublin Castle.

We ate lunch at The Bank on College Green, which is a very ornate former banking hall. After that it was time for our Guinness Tour. I'd never even tasted Guinness before that day, and will most likely never drink it again, but the experience was well worth it. We booked the Connoisseur tour, which meant 16 people got a private tasting at our own bar for 1.5 hours. Our guide was fantastic! The sample pours were really full glasses and they gave us 5 to try. They also taught us how to do the "perfect pour" of Guinness from the tap. The tour ended with a drink at the Gravity Bar, which has outstanding views of Dublin. We met a couple Welsh guys and ended up talking about American sports for quite a while!

Dinner that night was at The Church, which as you may have guessed, is a 300 year old church converted into a restaurant. It still has an impressive organ and stained glass windows on display.

After dinner, we walked over to Grafton Street, but most of the shops were already closed. We did get to see the cute umbrellas on Anne's Lane though.

We thought our night was ending then, but little did we know another adventure was around the corner! When we got back to our car park at 8:30pm, we discovered the gate was locked up, with no way for us to get inside and retrieve our car. Oops. Apparently closing time was 8pm. There was a phone number posted, so we called for help and they told us it would likely be an hour before anyone could come. So, we sat on a street corner in Dublin for an hour, waiting for rescue. When the guy arrived, the first thing he said when he got out of the car was, "I hope I have the keys." !!!! He dug around in a bag in the trunk for an uncomfortably long time before finally finding the keys and unlocking the gate for us. We had to pay him 40 euro (on top of the parking fee), but then we were on our way! 

Day Three took us to Northern Ireland for some outdoor adventures while Scott & Kyle had booked a guided tour elsewhere. We stopped for brunch at Dooleys (yummy Nutella pancakes) to break up the 2+ hour drive. We were literally just a few minutes away from our destination when we discovered the round-about exit we needed was closed and the only available detour added 20 minutes to our drive. That was a bummer! Also, the last road heading into Todd's Leap was tiny, yet supposedly was supposed to be able to handle two-way traffic. Talk about stressful.

At the adventure park, we booked off-road driving, blind-fold driving, and the giant swing. Meezy, my sister, and brother-in-law attempted the off-road driving, which meant driving a manual Land Rover on their treacherous course, but after having already driven us for the last 2.5 hours, I opted out! The cars had obviously been beaten up by previous drivers, and my sister left her mark too. Lol.

Next up was the big swing. We've done similar swings at amusement parks, but we figured we'd give this one a shot since it was in a new country. It didn't go as high as others we've seen, but the views were cool once you started swinging. Meezy was responsible for pulling the rip cord and he snapped the string during one of our rounds. That was a fun mini heart attack for a second. 

Last up was blind-fold driving. It was light-hearted and surprisingly less stressful, so I gave it a shot. Basically, your guide sits in the front seat beside you and handles the gas, and you're only responsible for steering. If you get too crazy, she has a kill switch to prevent you from crashing. The rest of the group is in the back and is supposed to help you navigate with directions of "left", "right", "straight", etc. Of course there is going to be some deception to make it more fun! 

We headed back toward Dublin for dinner and met up with Scott & Kyle at a cool sports bar called McGowans. We were able to catch some American football since it was Sunday night. We didn't stay out too late though because the next morning we had a very early flight to Munich! 

Got That New New

Living in an older home means there are endless projects to tackle. A couple of the big ones we have knocked out so far this year were replacing part of our fence and replacing a few of our exterior doors. I have no idea how long ago the wooden fence was originally installed at our house, but it's been in place since at least our ownership, which has been 9 years. It's been leaning in one section for a while, and got quite a bit worse over the past year. Another section had been covered in ivy, but after the deep freeze of 2021 killed the plants, we removed them to find the boards were pretty deteriorated and old. 

I've heard people being hit lately with massive quotes on fence replacement, so I was bracing myself. Luckily, we found a guy who would place the supplies order on our behalf, so we could pay the distributer directly, thereby insuring no markup on supplies. Then we paid him for labor after the job was done. I have to think that lowered our overall cost. I'm very pleased with the end results!

For the doors project, it took a little longer than I had hoped from order to installation because of supply chain issues. Still worth the wait, though! We replaced a couple doors to an outside supply closet, our back patio door, and our double front doors. The front doors definitely had the biggest improvement! 

Before and after of back patio door

Outside before view of front doors

Inside before view of front doors

Outside after view

Inside after view

The new look is much more modern and lets light inside, while still ensuring privacy. The previous doors didn't let any light in, so the entry way was always very dark. 

Still a lot more projects on the to-do list, including painting our brick and remodeling our pool, but it's always nice to get a couple more under our belt. 

Sweet Sixteen

Sometimes our 16-year marriage has been about the exciting moments - like the time Jer bought a spectator pass at my VIP experience with tennis pros because I wanted someone to take pictures of it. Or the time we had a field pass before a 49ers game and he slipped past security, so I waved him on while I turned back, because I knew it would be awesome for him to shake the owner's hand. 

Sometimes it's been about the sad moments - holding each other after the loss of loved ones and pregnancy losses.

Sometimes it's been about the small moments - watching Jeopardy together every day and taking turns on kid duty in the mornings so the other gets a few extra minutes of sleep.

No matter the day, no matter the moment - it's always been about love, mutual respect, honesty, and friendship. It feels like we've already lived a lifetime together, and I'm incredibly grateful for that. Bring on the next 16!