County barely registers on Yelp.com in reviews written by
out-of-towners
”
This must be the granddaddy of all California roadside produce
stands,
”
Rick H. said of Casa de Fruta.
”
… this produce stand has evolved over the decades into a
full-blown roadside pit stop and tourist attraction.
”
County barely registers on Yelp.com in reviews written by out-of-towners
“This must be the granddaddy of all California roadside produce stands,” Rick H. said of Casa de Fruta. “… this produce stand has evolved over the decades into a full-blown roadside pit stop and tourist attraction.”
Rick H. isn’t a roadside historian and he’s not a local. He’s just one of two people who have submitted reviews of the Pacheco Pass tourist attraction on Yelp.com, one of many online review sites that allow locals and tourists alike to post their opinions.
Yelp.com allows people to review everything from restaurants to dog groomers. Reviewers sign up for a free account, create a user name, upload a photo or icon to represent themselves and award one to five stars to places they’ve frequented.
Each review is accompanied by an address, telephone number and a Web site, if available, for each business.
Rick H., whose online icon is a yellow cartoon bird, awarded 5 stars to Casa de Fruta and has submitted more than 1,000 reviews to the site.
The reviews are anonymous – accompanied by as little as a first name and last initial – and they run the While metropolitan areas such as San Jose have thousands of places reviewed, with as many as 50 reviews of some locations, places farther off the beaten path such as San Benito County are just now making their way on to the sites.
On yelp.com, nearly 25 places in San Benito County have been reviewed, though most have only two to three reviews. According to the site, there are more than 1,600 other places that could be reviewed.
One confusing aspect of the site, created in San Francisco in 2004, is that sometimes reviews of the same place are not linked together which can be inconvenient for users. The way it is supposed to work is that as more reviews of the same place are added, an average opinion takes shape so people can see which places are consistently liked or disliked.
But for at least one listing in San Benito, the two reviews of the place are not linked. San Juan Oaks Golf Club has two individual reviews – one that gave it five stars and one that gave it four stars – but the two reviews would give a more accurate portrayal if they were linked together and the golf course was rated 4.5 stars.
A perusal of the reviews of San Benito area sites on Yelp.com revealed that most reviews were written by people who live outside the county. Two of the tourist attractions that drew reviews included Adventure Center Skydive and Swank Farms.
“If you’ve never jumped out of a perfectly functioning airplane at 15,000 feet before, you’ve really got to try it,” wrote Tessa M., who complimented the Hollister skydive instructors on their thorough instruction.
Another Bay area tourist, Jess S., used the site to proclaim her feelings about the Swank Farms corn maze – a Halloween fun staple for many San Benito residents.
“It takes a lot to get me in the car and headed to anywhere south of SFO, so I am very pleased to report that the drive to Hollister for the Swank Farms Great Corn Maze was worth it,” Jess S. wrote.
For locals, the reviews by tourists tell a tale we’ve known all along – there are plenty of great places to eat, drink and have a good time in San Benito.
