As some of you may have seen in my Instagram and which I posted briefly about here on the blog, I went to visit one of my sisters who lives in the San Rafael/Bay Area recently. The specific event we had in mind to enjoy together was the California Artisan Cheese Festival, now in its 12th year, that celebrates California cheese with tours, seminars, tasting events, and a cheese market. Here’s a look at my review and recap of my experiences, divided among several posts. First I’ll start with my favorite activity during the festival, the Artisan Cheese Festival Tour.

I took off an extra day, Friday March 22, to enjoy the first full day of this 3 day, weekend cheese festival. The first day was devoted mostly to artisan tours to cheesemakers and local artisans via a bus with a group of 25-30 people. The tour I selected was called “Sensory Sebastopol”, which is basically the area 30 minutes away from Petaluma that our tour stops were concentrated on. The tour included a cheese seminar, a visit to 2 cheesemakers, a cheese lunch, and a visit with a distillery. I will cover the cheese seminar and the first cheesemaker, Bohemian Creamery, in this post.

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