By Clyde Noel

Two days of beautiful fall weather, tasty recipes, 120 classic cars and hundreds of painted faces made the 12th annual Celebrate Los Altos Fall Festival a hit for residents.

“This is a local event for local people,” said Juli Rose, president of the Los Altos Chamber of Commerce. “You see your friends and your neighbors, and it brings people downtown for a family fun event.”

“Everything seems to be going great this year,” said Sandra Bozich, volunteering from Eyes Optometry. “The show seems to get bigger each year, with local chefs being interactive with the people.”

Lee Lynch, in charge of volunteers, said she had more volunteers than places to assign them. More than 100 residents volunteered to make the event a success. Lynch placed 60 of them in wine and soda booths.

Cathy Burrma and her husband, John, were pouring wine and beer in the chamber of commerce booth and noticed wine and beer moved better this year than last.

“Must be the weather, because when it’s hot people want sodas,” Cathy said. “When it’s cool like this, people like to drink wine.”

Javier Alcala, assistant district attorney of Santa Clara County, helped prepare kits for children by fingerprinting and noting identification marks in case of kidnapping or getting lost.

“We make a lot of shows, but this is a good show for us because we see a lot more local residents,” Alcala said. “People come from everywhere for the art & wine show, but this festival is mostly local residents with their kids. We made more than 300 kits for children this weekend.”

Volunteer Bob Mabe was extremely happy with the caliber of classic cars and the quantity. On Saturday, 65 classic cars arrived by show opening; and on Sunday, there were 63 cars that were different from the first day’s.

Mayor Kris Casto, classic car judge on Sunday, awarded the Los Altos Mayor’s Award to the 1929 fire engine from the Los Altos Fire Department. The Model A truck was the first fire engine in the Los Altos Fire Department.

One of the major draws of the festival is the Chef’s Galley. On Saturday, Jamie Smith from Left Bank in Menlo Park brought in several local residents to watch him make classic French sauces.

Sunday’s highlight was the Iron Chef Showdown between Chris Yeo of Strait’s Cafe and Lawrence Chu of Chef Chu’s. No one picked a winner when results of the food preparation were dispersed among the audience. The chefs did appreciate the lengthy applause.

The rock climbing always draws a lot of attention, and 7-year-old Caroline Hickman of Los Altos Hills tried four times to reach the top before she mastered the diagonal steps.

Children’s Alley was, as always, full of activity, with face painting, candle art, spin art and the duck pond. The receipts of Children’s Alley are destined to go to the Los Altos schools.

The fall festival acts as a fund-raiser for the chamber of commerce, and officials were pleased with the results by the end of Sunday evening.