We dropped the dogs off Friday night at their sitter's place so we could set an early departure time on Saturday morning for our long drive up to the Gilroy Garlic Festival. We've meant to attend for the past few years, but something always interfered.

It took some four-and-a-half hours to drive that far north, but the garlic ice cream and garlic shaved ice made the trip worth it. We also bought some garlic cheese powder, garlic stuffed olives, garlic mustard, and a few pounds of garlic cloves. While there we also ate various other garlic foods. Ah... the smells of a garlic fest!!!

Overall the festival seemed well-organized, although a lot of people showed so traffic lines were long, and it was hot out. Of course all the food vendors charged rather high prices, as did the arts and crafts booths. Thus, with the long drive and $10 admission fee, I'd rank it middlewise - worth doing once for sure.



These small FREE garlic ice cream cones hit the spot! Much better than last time in Ithaca, where garlic ice cream was basically vanilla with garlic cloves in it. This garlic ice cream actually had garlic flavor.



My garlic "snow cone" tasted so yummy that I'm going to try replicating it at home one of these days.



We decided to drive back along the coast, checking out the wonderful rocky vistas, with pine trees and fog. Spent a great deal of time talking about my new business plans. Stopped to see some elephant seals, and had a terrific Thai dinner in San Luis Obispo.


A ______ (pod?) of male elephant seals make many funny noises while lying about in the sand.