Monday, July 03, 2006

In my seemingly neverending quest to visit every crappy amusement park within driving distance of my house, today the family went to visit Bonfante Gardens, a theme park is located in the metropolis of Gilroy.

Oh? You non-Californians haven't heard of Gilroy? It's one of those towns so desperate for commerce that they have an annual festival celebrating a product that happens to be monetized within their city limits. It's like San Francisco's Sperm Week or Colma's Death Days. Gilroy's crack marketing team latched onto the concept of alliteration during the festival development and narrowed the festival choices down to Gilroy's Garbage Festival or the Gilroy Garlic Festival. It was a close vote.

Anyway, now Gilroy has another international sensation, Bonfante Gardens.

Obviously I entered the park with my mocking sensors turned way up. Crappy amusements parks are blogging gold. Gilroy is blogging platinum. Together? Blogging riches beyond my wildest dreams!

As it turns out, Bonfante Gardens is a pretty nice place. :(

The rides and attractions are mostly geared towards little kids, and given that I was toting a timid six year-old around, that's pretty much perfect. And there are trees and shade almost everywhere in the park. The place is landscaped beautifully. Large and graceful were spread throughout the park in a way that even Disney could learn from. The South Bay Area gets pretty hot during the summer, but I suspect this was one of the most pleasant places to spend a summer afternoon. Also, although everything was overpriced, the place is non-profit, so the money will go back into the park rather than stockholder's pockets (I never make money off the stock market. No reason anyone else should).

Finally, if you could have seen the glee on Daisy's face when she splashed in their little water play area, you would have lost a little cynicism too.

Maybe I really am out of things to complain about. Gah!

5 comments:

Willie Baronet said...

Mike, we welcome your optimism with open arms... :-)

Being a curmudgeon can be so tiring. (And I'm not sure about that spelling)

Mike said...

I may still have some curmedeonry left. I'll check my other pants.

Neel Mehta said...

Surprisingly, I've heard of Gilroy's Garlic Festival. I'm still holding out for the Weed Festival up in... Weed*.

Sorry to hear Bonfante Gardens didn't meet its titanium blogging potential.

* The real California town of Weed has a Chamber of Commerce, to which I've linked. It's important that Weed has such a chamber, because you can put your weed in it.

Unknown said...

I saw your pants with the curmedeonry stain on e-bay. Perfecta's helper is selling them for $19.99.

I can place a bid on them for you, if you want.

BTW, your posts are very enjoyable to read even when you have nothing to complain about.

Mike said...

Neel, so that's where I put my weed. I thought it was in my other pants.

jr, $19.99, eh? Hmmm, maybe that's a market I should get into. I can spew more curmudgeonry.