Still, you better put it out at Munich's Oktoberfest, or you'll face a fine.

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Make no mistake about it, Oktoberfest in Munich is a bucket list, once in a lifetime, activity of epic proportions.

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Most people might expect to suffer some ill effects from attending the famous Oktoberfest beer festival in Munich - but not to contract a potentially deadly virus from being bitten on the leg.

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And since 1950, the Oktoberfest has officially opened with the tapping of the first keg by the Munich mayor.

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Munich hosts one of the world's most famous municipal celebrations, known globally as Oktoberfest (although it is in fact held at the end of September) and known to locals as Wiesn (from the grassy expanse where it is held called Theresienwiese).

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In 2010 when I went to cover the vastly oversubscribed 200th anniversary edition of Oktoberfest and flights were scarce and I could not get a room within a hundred miles of Munich, I simply used Delta Vacations, who still had timely flights and blocked off rooms in key downtown hotels.

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