So last Friday, we drove down to the cute little town of Hermann, MO with our friends Erin and Brent to partake in a weekend of revelry, merriment and general Oktoberfesting.

Hermann’s German roots are still alive and well and there’s a brewery and six different wineries within just a few miles of the downtown area. It was awesome.

I think the fun we had on our trip can best be expressed in a monologue from the 2006 major motion picture Beerfest.  And also by the following photo montage:

Here we all are at dinner on Friday night. I think this was right after a very nice local man came up to us and asked if we wanted to buy some of his “Pro-Life” raffle tickets. The prize? A hunting rifle. Welcome to Hermann.

The next series of shots effectively depicts me getting annoyed at Will because he kept taking the picture before I was ready. He subsequently redeemed himself by finally getting a pretty decent shot of me and Erin.

We found this Oktoberfest hat at another bar we went to, so of course one of us had to put it on.

Turns out it belonged to our server and by the end of the night we had used our impressive skills of persuasion to convince her to give it to us. Did I mention that I was the only non-lawyer on this trip? But then we felt bad and decided to let her keep it.

Tin Mill is the local brewery in Hermann. I highly recommend their Oktoberfest. Although, I have yet to meet an Oktoberfest beer I didn’t like.

Can I tell you how annoying it is to type “Oktoberfest” so many times!? My fingers keep wanting to spell it with a “c” – the correct way. I think I’ve wasted about 10 minutes so far hitting the backspace key.

Moving on…

Here’s a shot of charming downtown Hermann.

The bed & breakfast we stayed at was in the top floor of the building on the far right.

This was our first B&B experience. Let’s just say it was…interesting.

Linda and Olan were our hosts. Linda was a nice woman and expert maker of French toast who made an effort to hide her look of disdain when the four of us showed up for breakfast hungover, unshowered and in our pajamas. Olan was a chatty fellow with conservative leanings and a penchant for leather vests. Our rooms were festooned with American flags and patriotic decor and we had to pray with everyone before we ate.

So pretty standard for small-town rural Missouri.

Before heading to the wineries on Saturday, we decided to check some of the antique shops downtown. Also, we had no idea where to find the winery trolley, so we were pretty much just wandering around aimlessly with nothing better to do.

The antique stores all smelled like the garbage bag full of my mom’s old toys that my grandma used to drag out of the basementwhenever we went to visit her and my grandpa when I was little. Also, they had some pretty cool stuff!

Here we are at the first winery.

“Look, lederhosen!”

I put that exclamation in quotes because I actually yelled that when I saw these guys. Well, I didn’t mean to yell it, but that building was very echo-y.

We drank a bottle of wine, walked up and down a big hill and listened to some polka music. All before noon.

After lunch, we hopped aboard the winery trolley (convenient, right??) and headed to our second stop: Stone Hill Winery.

Deciding on a bottle here was an intense process. It required many, many tastings. Many tastings.

Ohhh, this is why I don’t get carded anymore! Apparently people 7 years younger than me can now drink alcohol. Mere babies, I tell you.

After our tasting we bought a bottle and proceeded to take pictures of our heads on cardboard German people’s bodies, roll down hills, and jump around wildly. You know, the usual.

Our final stop was Oak Glenn winery.

It was a lot less thought-provoking than one my assume by looking at that picture.

The view was good, but the wine…well let’s just focus on the view.

The view!

The trolley ride back to town was good, if only for the fact that we made it back alive. It was standing room only, and I think Def Leppard was blaring on the speakers and some girl next to me told me that I should “grind up on that guy.” Grind. On a trolley. Who did she think I was, some contestant on The Bachelor??

Once we got back to town, we headed to our B&B to watch the Mizzou game and find out that it’s really hard to take naps on antique apholstered benches.

And that about sums up the trip!

So what is everyone being for Halloween?? I’m going as Audrey Hepburn a la Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

Mooooooon riiiiiiiverrr…