The Loft Wine Bar

Mare Island was the Navy’s first Pacific shipyard, and this Benicia taproom turns that history into fresh ales and stouts worth the detour off the Carquinez Strait.

A sunny deck on the Tiburon waterfront since 1920, Sam’s has been watching Bay traffic for over a century and somehow still feels like the best afternoon plan anyone in Marin has ever had.

Herb Caen said there was nothing much to do on this stretch of waterfront except Pier 23 and Red’s, a backhanded compliment that still holds. Johnny Depp interviewed Hunter S. Thompson over tequila here, Sammy Hagar threw a launch party here, and the crab and chowder have not needed to change a thing since 1985.

A dive bar on the outside with unexpected art deco touches inside, Hi Dive earns its Embarcadero patio at Pier 28, flip-flop casual with a bay view good enough to upgrade a basic margarita.

A 1984 pier fire took out everything around it, and Red’s survived because a fireboat literally named Phoenix saved it. Sourdough burgers with no lettuce and no tomato, those are the rules, on a patio that stares straight at the Bay Bridge. Anthony Bourdain called it where locals actually go. He was not wrong.