Final weekend of Leavenworth Oktoberfest

Welcome back in to Seattle News Today. Right now, a live look out towards Leavenworth. Man, a beautiful day out that way. We are heading into the third and final week. Yes, our own little Bavaria here in Washington getting ready to wrap up its third and final weekend in the middle of this gorgeous area. I mean, just what a beautiful setting, right? You want to get those leather hoses ready, though, because it is Thursday. We're getting close to the weekend. And last call for Oktoberfest in Leavenworth. After two weekends of all the fun and festivities, we are gearing up for that final round of music, dancing, food, and of course, some steinholding competitions as well. Executive Director Troy Campbell joining us live right now from out there in Leavenworth. First and foremost, I just want to say thank you so much for joining us today. How are you doing there, Troy? Good and tug. I'm doing great today. Thank you for having me. Now, we got that that beautiful view of what Leavenworth is. I see behind you, you've got the crowds from a past event. I mean, for those who are uninitiated, Oktoberfest in Leavenworth. What's this event look like? Oh, my gosh. Well, three weekends. We're on our final weekend this Friday. We open at 6 o'clock. We're open 6 to midnight on Friday and noon to midnight on Saturday. And we are jam-packed with dine-hunting competitions, costume contests. We've got the Inn and Schuhplattler dancers and tons of bands that are going to be performing for us this weekend. now obviously there there's a lot of pieces and parts to this entire event do you have a personal favorite because there's there's a lot to choose from right like like what stands out to you what if you weren't the executive director if you were just random tourists what would be the thing that gets you out to Leavenworth the thing that really uh creates a crowd uh and draws a lot of people is the sign holding competitions and we hold several of them throughout the day the one you see behind me is the two o'clock lady steinholding competition at the gazebo and then we have one up at the fest hall and we have one in our other uh performance tent those are really big and uh people are coming from across uh across the country our first weekend was actually a um an official steinholding competition uh round uh and our person went on uh that one went on to perform at the Northwest Oktoberfest and has won state and will be moving on so uh that is one of the biggest fun events but then of course the entertainment uh we're going to be closing down uh this uh this October fifth with the Freddie Feister band which is in from Tyrol Austria uh amazing band they're going to be fun um and just before them is our Queen of Oktoberfest Manuela Horn now you get the band from Austria it obviously looks feels the vibes are there you know one of the things that always does blow me away you mentioned that you guys are pretty familiar with the tourists out there every time i go to Leavenworth lately i'm always amazed by the amount of tourists and i'll be honest i was meeting folks from Germany from Austria the last time i was out there like wait a second like they're it's almost they're doing the compare and contrast i gotta be honest there's a lot of smiles out there so uh that's the one thing i wanted to talk about the the expansion of the event because there are some folks that obviously i mean you hear Oktoberfest you think Leavenworth if you're a local you've probably been out there but things change year to year you guys have kind of expanded it looks and feels a little bit different you've added spaces that we can go to like what what should we kind of plan for if we're heading your way yeah we've kind of expanded some areas and contracted in some areas uh what's really good to know for families is that we have a Kinderplatz which is a kid's place uh and we have free activities face painting um and a root beer garden and uh free yard games that kids can play uh and then also a ferris wheel and some really fun activities for families as well as those coming to enjoy, of course, the number one thing about Oktoberfest is our beer. We have imports of Paulaner and Weihenstephan and also our local beers, Doghouse, Icicle and Blue Moon Breweries. Now, that's really cool that you guys are getting the kids involved as well. It is fun when you have a spot for the family so you can kind of enjoy all of that. Now, of course, we've got to talk about the food. I mean, if we're going to be bringing the kids, we've got to find out what they're going to be eating uh you all go out of your way to make sure that we're getting a little bit of bavaria here yes you will definitely find brats and pretzels and uh we even have goulash uh so there's a lot of traditional food uh but then we also have um you know your normal fare we got the corn dogs and some hamburgers and things like that so there's a little bit of both so you can uh go the complete german route or you can uh stay with something a little bit uh more uh safe for uh you if you don't want to experiment but uh but great food and then of course across town uh great restaurants all across town so this is a really big weekend for all of our restaurants in town um and we've got some amazing ones um and a shout out to Rheinhaus who is one of our top sponsors this year uh and this is a great place uh to visit and they have a lot of these places have their own little mini Oktoberfest steinholding competitions and things going on so you don't necessarily just have to come inside the the fencing uh to have a good time there's all kinds of stuff fun stuff going on all across town and of course the fall colors are absolutely spectacular right now i'm glad you mentioned it because the fall colors i i was looking at some of these live images coming into our newsroom and for our viewers at home if you look uh right there next to the the horse and carriage we we've got the colors on display the mountain drop and the backdrop uh absolutely picturesque now you mentioned the steinholding competitions i'm not gonna lie i was a little surprised i didn't hear about the mustache showdown the mustache showdown i i needed to know a little bit more about this because i had not i had not realized that that was one of the things that you guys were doing so like for the uninitiated the mustache showdown what what am i doing how am i getting ready for this thing uh you get ready for it uh by uh doing some spectacular grooming uh but really i'll i'll let you in on a little secret the mustache you just have to show up and volunteers are picked from the crowd um and we've had males and females uh participate now i gotta do more i gotta yeah yeah yeah so um and really it is uh it is all about presentation and how you present your mustache to the crowd so um you know you may go in there with a beautiful mustache you may not win if you're not really playing to the crowd so that's my tip work the crowd good man and we saw from the picturesque view behind you that the crowd is huge and it looks like you know that's one of the things that i love about this is clearly like you're in the mood for it right you you come there ready to have a good time so for you what's it like i mean you're getting close to the end i'm sure that this is kind of like a joyous time but also kind of a sad time like you guys got to be uh in love with this event it brings so much uh activity tourism etc to Leavenworth so as we get close to this final weekend i mean what do we looking glass half full glass empty uh are we excited are we a little bit sad here we're a little bit sad um always this is a really fun time it's a really uh it's a big it's a big thing to put on uh but we really don't have time to to even catch a breath because as soon as we start breaking this down we start decorating for christmas um and so we have christmas town right around the corner we already have the schedule up uh and all the fun things to do throughout the month of december so we don't we don't miss a beat we go from right into octoberfest to start putting lights on trees it's funny you say that because uh i i just threw up the live camera so our viewers can see this like they our viewers will get very familiar with all these views especially our evening programs once upon a time I work weekends uh every single show we are bumping in and out of commercial breaks with that gorgeous view of the lights twinkling up there in Leavenworth me when you quite literally are filming Hallmark Channel movies up there time and again, I guess it gives you a little bit of extra oomph that this truly is a Christmas town as well. So I always like to kind of open this up and ask you, hey, I've got a lot of questions for you, Troy. I think we've hit Leavenworth and Oktoberfest pretty well, but frankly, you know this event better than anyone. So what am I going to ask you about? What do you want viewers to know to maybe ensure that they coming your way this weekend tickets are still on sale you can still get tickets both friday and saturday or a weekend pass that saves you 10 bucks um on the combo uh and also we just launched a new web app uh if you go to on your phone leavenworth.org slash today that is an amazing little tool that has the entire oktoberfest schedule things you can bookmark that you don't want to miss like the competitions or a certain band performing or the dancers happening uh you can use that it shows you information about parking the shuttles all of the things that you need to know right on your right on your phone so it's a great little tool again it's leavenworth.org slash today Troy cannot thank you enough for being with us today walking us through it wish you all the best of luck i hope it's a great weekend and uh hey looking ahead uh let's hang out closer to christmas we'll bring you back on we'll talk about those lights because i got to get some facts and figures on that i need to know how you guys pull this thing off because uh that is an amazingly quick turnaround that you guys are getting ready for. All right. Well, thank you. Prost to you. Prost. All right. Time right now is 1.23. Real quickly here, guys, I want to get you guys...