Sunday, November 8, 2009

Beering in Bavaria: Fussen


So after a couple days of taking a few years off of our lives acting a fool at Oktoberfest, we decide to take a little excursion to the countryside. Well, only two of us. The other guys were not feeling the 2 hour train ride out to Fussen, but that castle was too bad ass for us to miss, so we split up 2 back at the Weisn and 2 going to Fussen at the foot of the German Alps.

The train ride was pretty nice, and went by fast. It helped that we met a couple of backpackers. I notice a couple of local beer houses with brands I've never heard of before while on the train: AWESOME!! We switched trains to a less attractive train for the last 45 minutes. I couldn't help but notice that way out in the countryside, the German teenagers dressed like they were straight out of the BET Awards. I'm talkin' baggy coats, baggy jeans, and they all had New York Yankees or Mets baseball hats, all turned to the back. Hilarious! The school age children that got on the train were wearing at least the baseball hats. Couldn't spell Mets if I spotted them the M and the E. Hip Hop has taken over the world's youth. Kinda odd that the only people that live the hip hop lifestyle past age 22 are black people. Every other ethnic group wises up. ANYWAY, enough race relations.

I'm not gonna bore you with endless pictures of the Neushwanstein Castle and whatnot. But I will say that I've fiction stories of a rich noble trying to model a landscape or an area like a painting. Indeed, there isn't a major city that doesn't have city planners that try to make their downtown areas look extremely picturesque. Until I made it to Fussen, I thought that Gaudi did the best job of it, just outside of Barcelona. However, Ludwig II's boys truly captured the whole life inside a painting. The Castle inspired stories like Sleeping Beauty, but at every angle, there is a fantastic marriage of nature and architecture. Combined with the view on the bridge which has the lakes in the background, or from the other side with the Alps in the background. I'm talking about every blade of grass, every leaf on the ground, even the town with it's shops and old style hotels that were surely added later, all fit perfectly. The castle itself was designed by a painter, and it truly shows. Rembrandt would be jealous. Ok ok, let's beer it up.

After hanging out all day, we go to the aptly named Cafe Bistro Relax in Fussen. Nice relaxing atmosphere with a SMOKING HOT waitress. Moving on. Most of their beers are by . Allgaeuer in Kempten, Germany, about 50km Northwest of Fussen.

Furstabt Weizen by Allgauer
Nose is yeasty and orange. Hazy with a big poofy head. Great orange and banana at first, then empties to a metallic coin thing. Gets dry and chalky at the end. Medium body. 2 Star.

After some beer trading (everyone else liked that Furstabt), I got my hands on the Urtyp Export.

Urtyp Export
Typically I'm not a fan of Dortmunder Exports. Nice clear straw color. Taste has a nice strong hoppiness with a high carbo. Good basic beer with some power to it. 3 Star. Probably the best Export I've had.

Teutsch Pils
Yeasty again. Brilliantly clear. The taste was okay for a pils, but a little funky. 2 Stars.

Not the best I've had with all the Oktoberfest beer, but an excellent excursion. We made it back to the train station in Munich pretty late and things were a little off. Lots of cops and whatnot around. Anyway, I was able to score a couple nice bock beers out of the bottle at the train station. It was the best beer I had the whole trip and I did not write it down. LOST OPPORTUNITY.

That was the end of the trip. We hung out at the bar at the hotel with the old crew telling stories and talking smack with the other Westerners. From there it was onward to New York. But I was waaaaaaay too alcoholed out for any Brooklyn Beer. The beauty is that they didn't have any real selection anyway. We were all basically sick and on detox for a good week after the trip. Just a great time overall.



Best beer: Paulaner Oktoberfest

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