Dive Deeper Into a Destination by Attending a Local Festival

I hadn’t even looked out the window of my hotel on the outskirts of Munich until the morning after my arrival. A delayed flight and a rainy late-night transfer from the airport kept my jet- lagged vision of my surroundings blurry as I checked into the only hotel available outside the city limits. I hadn’t booked that Bavarian bed and breakfast for its charming breakfast spread or its idyllic views of emerald pastures ebbing and rising in the distance, though I was quickly taken with its surprising beauty. Instead, I had booked it for its ideal distance between the airport and the festival grounds of Munich Oktoberfest, so I made a single note in my journal to come back to this place if my travels ever brought me back to Bavaria.

© SANTIAGA | DREAMSTIME

I was in town for one purpose: to experience my first-ever Munich Oktoberfest, and yet my journal began to grow fuller and fuller with each beer tent I visited and each bratwurst hut line I waited in. No matter where I stood or sat, conversations struck up with other visitors and locals about favorite restaurants in town or must-see sights off the beaten path. My agenda was spoken for on this vacation — one filled only with festival foods, music and dancing — but I began to get a better sense of the region and its true heartbeat as I listened to fellow travelers and locals share their favorite parts of the area with me. My heart and belly were full as I left, wearing a half-eaten “Ich Liebe Dich” cookie around my neck, and so was my journal, loaded with a complete itinerary for my next visit to Munich.

To some, traveling for a festival may not seem like the best way to see a destination’s historic sites or to get a feel for day-to-day life in a specific city, but it does offer an incredible opportunity to soak in the culture and traditions. It’s also just a great way to get a feel for a destination before committing to a longer and more detailed visit. Festivals bring people together, and at the core, that’s what travel is all about. Travel aims to break down barriers, incite conversation, and open minds to new ideas and new ways of thinking; and there are few better ways to do all those things in a condensed amount of time than by attending a local festival.

© IAKOV FILIMONOV | DREAMSTIME

I once traveled solo to Spain’s mountainous region of La Rioja to take part in La Batalla del Viño (The Battle of Wine). Alongside hundreds of strangers all dressed in white, I hiked to the top of a hill high above Haro, armed with a bota bag filled with new wine from the harvest, and spent my morning staining strangers’ clothes with a steady spray of red wine while my own outfit became saturated with the drink. Even my hair dripped with wine while I watched drenched Spaniards singing and dancing in unison in a slosh of purple puddles. I had known no one while going up the hill that morning, but I came down with a group of local winemakers who generously let me warm my chilled, wine-soaked body by their makeshift fire. We made our way down the mountain together, and I spent the rest of the afternoon sharing meals and stories with these former strangers as we sat in streetside cafés among fellow festival goers. Again, my one purpose was to show up and attend a festival, but the friendships I made that day have lasted just as long as the purple stains that linger on my once-white shoes that still hold a special place in my closet.

The younger generation gets it, with a recent survey from Faye Travel Insurance noting 21 percent of millennial and Gen Z travelers invest in concert tourism, which includes traveling for a live music show or festival. Among this demographic, concert tourism is more popular than sports tourism, with just 14 percent investing in trips that hinge around seeing games and races. The festivals attracting this demographic may seem obvious — the list including Coachella, Stagecoach, Burning Man and Lollapalooza — but the study also found the appeal of traveling for a festival is not always just for the festival itself.

“There’s so much less planning involved, as these are multiday events, so they come chock-full with entertainment,” said Lauren Gumport, vice president of communications, Faye Travel Insurance, app-based insurance that protects hotel, flights, festival tickets and more in less than 60 seconds. “It’s a no brainer for a long weekend with friends.”

Gumport also noted being prepared goes a long way toward enjoying a stress-free festival getaway. “Over the last few years we’ve seen the you-know-what hit the fan at some festivals,” she added. “If things go wrong, like medical emergencies or flight delays and cancellations, it’s best to be on the safe side and protect your trip investment.”

The stress, time and mental energy of planning a vacation has increased in the last five years, with timed reservations the norm and spontaneous dinner plans no longer a viable option. Detailed itineraries are now almost necessary, and yet that level of detail takes time and energy leading up to the trip. Traveling with the sole purpose of attending a festival offers a refreshing change from traditional ways of travel.

Spontaneous dinner plans, a free day to explore at your leisure and “show up when you’re ready” defines festival travel. It offers the chance to travel freely because the main event has already been planned, and all that’s left is for festival goers to enjoy at their own pace. For some, that’s taking in a weekend of jazz concerts on the quaint streets of Québec; for others, that may mean throwing tomatoes in a crowded back alley in Spain.

PHOTO: © EDWIN CORREA | DREAMSTIME.COM

When it comes to choosing a festival, it matters little if it’s a festival dedicated to a specific type of music (like EDM festival Tomorrowland in Belgium or Monterey Jazz Festival in California), a festival dedicated to food (such as Salon du Chocolat in Paris or the National Cherry Festival in Michigan), or even if it’s a cultural observation (like Día de los Muertos in Mexico or Diwali in India). What matters is being in the destination itself during such a momentous event or celebration. There’s another layer you get to experience when you travel specifically for a festival that you just can’t experience on your home turf. For example, sipping a beer with friends at your local festival is great, but doing the same at the original Oktoberfest takes the experience to a different level.

Festival travel opens doors, and in my experience, it leaves open the chance for unexpected encounters or elevated moments of pure elation that wouldn’t be possible without a bit of a journey to get there. For many, the experience is the journey, and the journey is the experience… and in the end, it all comes down to finding the right festival to suit the experience you’re after.