I'm basically just echoing what Brian S. said because he is absolutely correct. On Saturday (the…read morefirst day), they were out of bacon within just a few hours. Never got any the rest of the day. The festival opened again on Sunday with absolutely no bacon. Ridiculous. The was the First Annual Bacon Festival in St. Augustine and I truly hope they never do it again. If they do, I most definitely will not be in attendance! We ended up going to Les Petit Pleasures http://www.yelp.com/biz/les-petits-pleasures-st-augustine?hrid=eZmkzXiQwoiofqYrP2xKNA and having an amazing BLT. Then we just bummed around Saint George Street the rest of the day.

What do you call a Bacon Festival without bacon? A gathering…read moreof food trucks. Until the Jaguars draft completes, there is a huge chance that this 1st annual Bacon Nation Food Festival will retain the exalted position of being my lowlight of 2014. On the one hand I was very proud and happy to support this inaugural festival and wish them every success with next year's event, but on the other hand this was a bit of a shambles. After teasing everyone at work about the Bacon Festival in Chicago being almost worth hitchhiking to, someone sent around an email alerting everyone to the Bacon Festival in St. Augustine. Instantly the office was a mass of hugging, cheering and dancing employees. A lottery win couldn't have elicited a more joyful environment. The words Bacon and Festival are two of the most magical, powerful combinations in the English language. Running on Sat 26th and Sunday 27th of April from 11:00am until 8:00pm, this 1st annual Bacon Nation Food Festival promised a variety of bacon-related foods, activities for the children, new culinary experiences and was a collection of some of the best vendors in Northeast and Central Florida, with "...more than 20 food trucks offering everything from dessert to authentic Hawaiian hotdogs." Everyone at work was going to be showing up at different time over the weekend, and as it so happened The Hublet and I managed to get the bulk of our weekend tasks completed early and rocked up to the Bacon Festival at about 11:30am on Saturday. Instantly impressed by the size of the queue waiting to get in, although the ATM near the entrance lead me believe that not everyone read the 'cash only' stipulation on their website. Entry tickets were $4 per person, with children aged 13 and under getting in free. Although I'm a bit of a grouch at having to pay to enter an event that gives you nothing in return for free and where I'll have to pay for everything I choose to do, I was honestly happy to pump some money into the 1st Bacon Festival in the hope that it would make them more inclined to return next year. While queuing we were struck with how empty the field looked, with a limited row of food trucks to the right, children's activities and games to the left and a small row of handicraft tents in the center. The Hublet and I wandered around the field, wanting to preview our options before committing to a bacon-related item...and were amazed at how few food trucks offered a standalone bacon item. Sure, you could pay $1-2 extra to add bacon to an existing food truck item, but there were no food items that existed simply to celebrate the wonder of bacon. No bacon ice-cream, no bacon beer, no bacon doughnuts or cupcakes, no bacon wrapped bacon stuffed with bacon (just some of the food fantasies that my colleagues and I had decided in the week leading up to the Festival that we were hoping to find). One truck, I can't remember the name...an orange truck...actually had the only queue of people in the entire field, and all because they were the sole truck who stepped up and made bacon their focal point with bacon brownies and so on. They had embraced the concept of the Bacon Festival and come armed with a menu that paid homage to bacon. The only things we ended up paying for were a glass of homemade lemonade and $2 for 2x tiny strips of bacon dipped in chocolate, which were a disappointment as it seemed to be the wrong choice of chocolate as it didn't work with the bacon at all However, for me one of the worst things about the event was the taunting guy on the microphone caged up in the kiddy area at one of the ball games...his annoying, overly loud commentary was amazingly irritating and added to the overall dismal feeling of annoyance - a live band, inviting a local radio station to commentate or even some background music would have been a great alternative. With a huge queue of people still lining up at the entrance to pay to enter, we were a bit sad at the letdown they were in for but I maintain that although the actual event was a huge disappointment, I'm very happy that I financially contributed and supported the first Bacon Festival in the area because I would love to see it return annually, albeit hugely improved.