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If you want to sit, you have to be quick: the first guests on their way to the marquee
Photo:
Sven Hoppe / dpa
Three hours before the official opening of the Munich Oktoberfest, thousands of Oktoberfest visitors have already flocked to the festival grounds.
The grounds on the Theresienwiese opened shortly after 9 a.m. on Saturday.
As a result, many who had waited in long queues since dawn rushed off to get a seat in the beer tent.
In the tents, however, the guests still have to be patient until they can quench their thirst: Munich's Lord Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD) will tap the first keg at 12:00 p.m. - only then will there be beer.
But many had taken precautions and started drinking in the early hours of the morning: the first people in dirndls and lederhosen were seen waiting in front of the festival grounds at 5 a.m., some of them visibly drunk.
The thirst is great: in 2020 and 2021 the meadows were down due to the pandemic.
There are no corona requirements this year.
Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder said that the number of infections should increase because of the festival.
"At the same time, fortunately, we are not measuring any excessive burden on the hospitals," the "Münchner Merkur" newspaper quoted him as saying.
You are in a new corona phase.
jpz/dpa