Steven Winn [SF Chronicle, 8 September 2008]

They came with their blankets and binoculars, babies and dogs, long-stem roses and goose-liver pate. Spread out across Sharon Meadow in the fog-filtered sunlight of Golden Gate Park on Sunday afternoon, a larger-than-usual crowd estimated by the producers at 19,000 to 20,000 took in the annual September rite of musical and communal picnicking pleasure known as Opera in the Park.