Beerfest! feat. Karl Luther

Karl arrived on Thursday afternoon, fresh from a trip to Munich.  It was the first time in three and a half months that I'd had an in-person conversation in good ol' Canadian English!  I gave him a 1-hour tour of Donaueschingen (that's all it takes to see the town), grabbed groceries, and proceded to cook exactly like we used to in Vancouver.  

Donauquelle (the start of the Danube river)

It's AMAZING!!

Cheers for Beers

On Friday we went to Shooter Stars (a local bar) and ran into Flo's sister and some of her friends.  Being the good-planning people we are, we stayed out past 3am. 

Caption is on the Shirt

Shoooooters

We slept in as late as possible on Saturday, and were out of the door by 9:00.  I felt bright and alert on the train to Frühlingsfest:

Pizzaz

The closer we got to Stuttgart, the higher the energy levels got on the train.  There were people all over the place wearing their lederhosen and drinking beer - and apparently wine:

We hopped off the train and saw a couple sights in Stuttgart before heading to the fairgrounds

It was about 1:30 when we arrived at our final stop.  Walking from the S-bahn (metro train) station, we followed the hordes of plaid shirts and dirndls towards the fairgrounds.  On the way, we passed an incredibly drunk, old, 6'6" black crazy man dressed to the nines in a dirty suit and top hat.  Making loud "nnnngngngnngghhhhhhhhhh" sounds, he would walk up to frauleins and ramble away incomprehensibly (maybe it was comprehensible to the locals).  The variety of reactions he got was impressive: some girls gave him a disgusted look and hustled away, while others mobbed him and posed for some assuredly memorable pictures.

While finishing our beers (it's the strangest feeling to drink on the street in plain view of the Police), a bottle-collecting, possibly homeless guy came up to us and struck up a conversation.  I threw in all the meaningless conversational words I knew, and answered the one question I recognized as he rambled on for 5 minutes.  We said goodbye, gave him our bottles, and told him we didn't speak German.  

The fairgrounds weren't anything special, but they weren't why we were there.  

Nope.  This is why we came: 

It was crowded at 2:00, and at capacity by 3pm.  The crowd was mainly young (the drinking age is 16), but there were large areas of mainly older people.  We walked around with our litre beers having jovial yelling conversations and an all-around good time.  

The massive tent (that stage in the distance ain't small)

Beer.

Also Beer.

This guy had a cigarette stuck through his earlobe

Wandering around, we ran into a group of 8 burly 'mericans who stuck out like 8 sunglass-wearing muscle-shirt-clad moustache-touting thumbs.  It was my first time meeting the epitome of the unwanted American traveler; they stood to the side of the tent, one of them throwing dirty remarks at girls walking by (to their credit, most of the guys tried to stop him).  Two of the guys were cool to talk to, but it wasn't a fun crowd to hang out with.  

Moving right along, we walked, drank, talked and danced as the tent became progressively more alcohol-infused

The music was all over the place

Let's play Spot the Sobriety!  Best of luck. 

Karl learned that language barriers are often non-existant with people our age when he tried asking some girls if they spoke English in a hilarious butchering of Spanish, German and English - in three words he managed to speak three langages, and none at all.  

Things were clearer after repeating in our native language

We hustled out for the last train home, which was at an unpleasantly early 9:15

Tearing up the streets

One more must-experience German adventure crossed off the list!