Oktoberfest Zinzinnati is this weekend, and there's a new location for the German heritage festival. Sawyer Point and Yeatman's Cove will hold beer halls, stages, and vendors. Chelsea York with the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber says there's a lot of advantages to the new site.
“The footprint down here is about a mile long, so very comparable to what our site on Fifth Street, and Second and Third Street was,” she says. “We’re really excited about the extra width that we get with the greenspace and the trees in the different areas of the park.”
York says the park will offer more places for people to sit and eat and drink, and more places to get out of the sun. Temperatures this weekend could be around 90.
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“We’ve taken a lot of care to introduce a Bavarian-style feel to the park here. You’ll notice that all the flagpoles have Oktoberfest flags flying,” she says. “We’ll be decorating every inch of this park to transform it into a Bavarian village.”
A large tent has been erected on the grass, near the west entrance to the park. Two more beer hall tents are up in the space between the Purple People and Daniel Carter Beard bridges. Zinzinnati Zircus will perform in the playground.
The River Stage will be the site for some of the other activities, including the stein-holding contest, the running of the wieners, and the annual chicken dance, which takes place at 4 p.m. Saturday..
According to the Chamber’s Amy Fitzgibbons, two famous Bengals will be recognized at this year's Zinzinnati Oktoberfest.
“This year we have Ickey Woods and David Fulcher … leading our chicken dance, along with the Bengals superfans, who will be on stage with them,” Fitzgibbons says. “Several years ago, we set the world record for the world’s largest chicken dance, and we’ve had that moniker ever since. It is just one of those annual Cincinnati traditions that people love to see, and so we bring it back here every year.”
Also along the Serpentine Wall, the Chamber has plans to set up a large screen LED television.
Fitzgibbons says the event draws a lot of people.
“We see people from all over the world come to this event, including from Germany and across the United States,” she says. “And we see that through hotel bookings.”
And the beer?
One of the cornerstones of any Oktoberfest celebration is beer. And Fitzgibbons says Oktoberfest Zinzinnati is no different.
“We will have 25 different breweries this year, including local breweries, German breweries, and our local Sam Adams,” she says. “Each brewery will be bringing their own Oktoberfest (beer); some will have other German-style beers as well.”
Fitzgibbons says they've ordered about 620 kegs of beer from Germany. She says there should be plenty of beer from local and other American brewers, too.
It's not easy getting that much beer.
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“One fun thing to know about getting the German beers here in Ohio, is that we only get so many cases and kegs every year,” she says. “We’ve always got to put our dibs in about a year early to try to snag all the kegs that we can, which is most of the kegs that are available in the state.”
Fitzgibbons says there's plenty to drink that's not beer, too.
And to give the beer something to wash down: food. She says there will be metts, brats, and cream puffs, along with a “German pizza,” and a pretzel corn dog.
Oktoberfest Zinzinnati opened Thursday afternoon at 4 p.m., and runs until 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, the festival is from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. The final day, Sunday, is also known as “Family Day” and is from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
