Mary Avila just couldn’t wait to start her three-day garlic
binge. She arrived at 7:40 a.m. and set up her chair, securing the
first spot in line and a front row seat for the ceremonial lighting
of burners in Gourmet Alley.
the opening ceremonies and of the Also check out more pictures
in our our
For more videos, photos and stories, scroll to the bottom of this story.
Mary Avila just couldn’t wait to start her three-day garlic binge. She arrived at 7:40 a.m. and set up her chair, securing the first spot in line and a front row seat for the ceremonial lighting of burners in Gourmet Alley.
“I’m ready to go in there and eat and have a good time, listen to music, Sha-Boom, get my bobblehead,” she said. “I’ll be here three days.”
Just before the gates opened at 10 a.m., a human chain was set up stretching from the flaming metallic garlic bulb near the entrance to the pyro chef area of Gourmet Alley, about 200 feet away. To the sound of The Doors’ Light My Fire played on accordion, festival President Ed Struzik climbed a ladder and dipped a torch into the bulb’s flame.
“Here we go,” he yelled. “It’s on.”
The torch then wound its way, passed hand to hand, from past festival presidents to dozens of members of Gilroy’s sister cities to Mayor Al Pinheiro to the garlic queen and her court to, finally, pyro chef Bob Filice.
With torch in hand, he and the other chefs unveiled a poster dedicating Gourmet Alley to Val Filice, who passed away late last year. On the sepia-toned poster, Filice is laughing while stirring a giant pot with a long wooden spoon.
“Now it’s called Val’s Kitchen,” Gourmet Alley volunteer Ken Fry said. “May the flames be with you.”
Bozzo then touched the flame to a burner and it flared up, delighting the 100 or so volunteers who had crowded around to watch. Cries of “mangia” came from all around.
Moments later, Struzik gave the OK to open the festival gates with a wave of his hand and dozens of people started filing in, including Avila. True to her intentions, she took off for the ranch side mercantile tent and purchased several Herbie bobblehead dolls, among other items. The tent already had a line several dozen long of volunteers outside the “Herbie Express” area.
The 30th-annual Garlic Festival and its cadre of volunteers have been busying themselves since dawn.
“What makes the Garlic Festival so special is all the volunteers that make it all happen,” Scott LeBlanc said.
The Gilroyan works for TaTech Steel, which set up the columns for the sun screens protecting hungry patrons from the sun. LeBlanc was merrymaking in the sun, though, drinking Budweiser with his brother, Mike LeBlanc, who stood in the sun next to him in a gossamer red shirt unbuttoned half way.
“I like people watching, and the entertainment,” Mike LeBlanc said.
“The beer,” added his girlfriend, Deneene Lundberg. “And the food.”
The couple hailed from Duluth, Minnesota – the hometown of Bob Dylan, Mike LeBlanc pointed out – and flew out here after succumbing to the siren of the garlic gala a few years ago.
As the heat climbed toward 90 degrees later this morning, Nicole Acosta and her husband, Cesar, bee-lined it to the rain tent, where people splayed out in the mist spraying from tiny tubes tied into the tent rafters.
“This was the first stop we made,” Nicole Acosta said. She had just arrived to her second festival with her husband, Cesar, who nodded his head before his sister, Karina Pesta, shouted, “Garlic fries!”
“I came here 15 years ago, and that’s what I remember,” Pesta said. All three came down from San Jose, and this time around – after she cooled down, of course – Pesta said she would try to stuffed mushrooms, no doubt.
Yeah, the food’s good, said Spencer McManus, 15, a sophomore at Gilroy High School who sold Gatorade and other thirst quencher on behalf of GHS Leadership, which funds dances and other student happenings. This is first time volunteering, second time attending, according to the recent emigrant from Cupertino.
“I love it here. It’s a close-knit community that’s growing at the same time,” McManus said.
“I like interacting with people and volunteering, and it’s for a good cause. And I love Ms. Berggren,” McManus added as Julie Berggren, the director of student activities at Gilroy High School, smiled while stuffing envelopes with freshmen orientation letters.
Two freshmen garlic festival patrons included recently hired Gilroy Police Department Chief Denise Turner and City Administrator Tom Haglund, who chuckled about the fun-feeling atmosphere compared to the tedium of city council meetings.
“The most impressive thing is all the volunteer effort,” said Haglund, who came from Hanford, after Capt. Kurt Svardal gave him and Turner – who came from the Seattle area – a briefing-slash-overview of festival.
“It’s amazing'” Turner said. “I haven’t had breakfast, so I’m looking forward to a pepper-steak sandwich.”
While he was not prepping the popular beef sandwich, festival volunteer Alfred Alciati stirred the scampi sauce like there was no tomorrow.
“This is sauce city. This is the heart of the Garlic Festival,” Alciati said as he mixed an odorous 20 gallon stainless steel pot of the creamy concoction with a wooden ore “that’s been here as long as I have.”
That’s since 6:30 a.m. this morning, 17 years total for the volunteer sauce chef from Morgan Hill. Alciati attended the first festival in 1979, which “got me interested in volunteering'” he said. The hardest part is the heat, but it’s worth it for the money he brings in for the severely handicapped at Antonio Del Buono Elementary School.
A few feet away Kathy Doughty chopped basil with her daughter, Laura, but they were not exactly sue what for.
“Someone just comes and takes the bucket every now and then,” Laura Doughty said as she giggled with her mother. Kathy Doughty has been volunteering for five years, she said, and the mother daughter duo were giving their time for the GHS Choir.
“I love working with my daughter, but standing for hours and hours is hard,” Kathy Doughty said.
Online Editor Christopher Quirk contributed reporting to this article.
