Fat, Fifty and Filthy: A German Beer Tour from Berlin to Munich

There is no better way to spend your midlife crisis than in a beer tour of Germany. So what if I am having a midlife crisis? Like any good bar-mitzva, it’s a rite of passage. A last “hee haw!” to drunken light hearted bravado, before my life descends into a slow and decrepit downward drop into old age. I decided that if I am going to do a midlife crisis, I am doing it big. It’s a case of bang or bust, and I choose BANG!

With tickets booked for Germany, I hired a supersexy Porsche convertible and hit the Autobahn with as much formidable power and style as a fat old guy like me can possibly muster. Across the Bavarian hinterland, it started out as a beer hop that gradually turned into a beer crawl and then by the vacation’s end, a barely identifiable consciousness. It was bloody awesome!

First Stop: Berlin’s Nightlife

Sexy and hyper trendy Berlin’s nightlife does not skip a beat. More than anything, what I love about this place is that it makes me feel young again. Oh God I so need that! It’s a city that had its heyday in the 80’s and 90’s, where the youngen’s at that time filled into factory halls and old subway stations and danced the night away. Those days may be over, but this city has not lost its zest. There are new party scenes popping out of the ground all the time like grey cement daffodils.

From behind the wheel of the Porsche 911 Turbo Cabriolet, I pull up stops in Kreuzberg and enter into BarbieBar. Clever name, I remember thinking at the time, with every positive association that it builds on the Barbie doll. Well, the folks there were most certainly friendly and it didn’t take long to get a beer in hand and start chatting with the locals.

One particular fellow introduced himself as Rupert. While I tend not to pay much attention, I remember noticing that he had particularly remarkable hair, gold locks that stood up and then gently flopped to the side. He started telling me about his Van Gogh art collection at home and how he loves to throw dinner parties. Not my usual choice of conversation, as it’s a steep jolt away from which prime minister’s wife you would bang, (my idea of talking politics), but what the hell? After all, when in Rome… as the old saying goes.  So I started telling him about dinner parties my ex had thrown, in which I was charged for committing a few supposedly anti-social faux-pas. He seemed to find those stories extremely funny, not exactly sure why though. But anyway, he then reached out to touch my hand and asked me to join him on the dance floor. It only struck me at that point, that there was a distinct lack of women in the bar, even compared to the pubs I frequent back at home. Hold on a minute… the light bulb finally switched on, this place was for queens! As much as my dance moves were unlikely to inspire any greater affections, I politely declined Rupert’s offer and headed my way out.

Second Stop: Oktoberfest

If you are anything like me, a true beer-lover at heart, there is no better place to worship the gods of the brew than at Oktoberfest. In the superb Porsche Turbo, I fly through the highways to arrive at Munich. Arriving at the concert grounds, I’m ready to live it up – BABY! Before I know it, I’m raising a litre of Weizen, chomping on warm pretzels and grooving my booty to the tunes of an oomph band.

While in line for a fill up of my second Helles, a large pale Germanic beer, the bloke standing next to me asks if I’ve seen a stall selling Bratwurst. Bratwurst are the iconic German sausages that are fatty high cholesterol kickstarters. “No, I don’t know of any”, I tell him, “but I’m happy to join any search team”. So after filling up our Helles, we walk around the grounds looking for Bratwurst. He explains that he and his friends measure their stupor on a Bratwurst barometer, as the oily sausages really help to absorb the alcohol keeping them all going for longer. “Sounds awesome”, I say. Oktoberfest was great, can’t say much about the music, but between this bloke and his couple of mates, our Bratwurst barometer was up somewhere around 182, we had countless more beers and I was still able to waddle my way back to the hotel.

Third Stop: Munich’s Art Scene

I arrive in Munich and meet up with an old friend, Claude, a divorced insurance salesman. He’s thrilled to see the super hot car that i’ve been driving and he’s desperate to spin the wheels in a night out on the town. He tells me about this bar that just opened up in Kunstpark Ost, that’s super classy and trendy. While that means fancy art and fiddly food, it also means promising hotties. “Well, isn’t that why I’m here?”

Looking smart and with every resource of suave that I can muster, we step into this bar called MarziPan and quite frankly it’s a disgrace. I mean, it’s this huge white hall with enormous modern art pictures hanging on the wall. All the pictures depict some form or angle of the male and female (mostly female) genitalia. You know, it’s kinda hard to throw out your lines to get into real living female pants, when you’ve got pictures of the finishing line blatantly displayed in front of you. I mean, how is a guy supposed to hold any sort of conversation in this sort of deck out? Despite the odds, I tear my eyes away from the pictures and do my best.

I approach a tall, trim lady with long black hair and ask her if she is one of the photographers? She said, “Yes, why do you ask”? I replied that “It’s because I can picture her and I together, forever, on one of those walls”. Conversation didn’t last long. Giving up, I thought I might as well pile away on the hors d’oeuvres. Despite being ridiculously small replications of food, they weren’t too bad. Not only that the waitress was cute. 10 hors d’oeuvres later, me and the waitress were hitting it off. By all means she wasn’t the prettiest bow in the drawer, but she certainly knew how to have a good time!

Overall, Germany turned out to be an excellent location to live out a mid-life crisis. With copious amounts of beer, a wicked sports car and a particularly lovely lady, it’s the kinda thing I’d like to get around to doing again.

Signed,

— A dirty old bastard.

This article was contributed by Fred (No, Not THAT Fred) Talbot, a regular client at Europe Luxury Car Hire. Europe Luxury Car Hire is a high-end car rental company offering luxury car rentals in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, France among other popular European destinations.