Aquatic Park Pier - by Mark Kozelek

"I woke up from the dream and I walked down to Aquatic Park. 
And from the pier I looked out into the fog. 
Soakin' up the air I could barely see Tiburon. 
Fisherman were fishing on the East side of the pier. 
Every day it's my pleasure to walk out here. 
Three seals poked their heads up from the water. 
These beautiful things are why I moved here."

—From "Couch Potato"

Aquatic Park Pier

I can't remember the first time I saw the Aquatic Park Pier with my own two eyes or walked along the pier, looking out at the sailboats. But I know it was the late 1980s. 

The first time I saw the pier on TV was when I was very young; the opening scene of Dirty Harry.

In the 1990s I fished on the pier fairly often for king fish and perch. Sometimes I'd take a crab net and pull crabs up out of the bay, as long as the seals didn't steal my bait. The bait I used for crab was usually a salmon head that I'd buy at Cala Foods (which has now been replaced by a Trader Joe's). Families would fish and/or picnic on the pier and there was no shortage of fishermen who drank beer, smoked weed and sometimes got a little rowdy. I remember once fishing on the west side of the pier when some thug had a half a fish on an enormous hook, winging it’s way out there, obsessed with trying to catch JAWS.

Back then, I would come home with no more than six kingfish or perch. The area was overfished. There were warning signs about what fish you could or couldn't eat and what fish that pregnant women definitely shouldn't eat and what fish were only safe to eat once a month because of the toxicity of the water and mercury levels. There were very strict rules about not taking female crabs and the fines could be very steep if you broke the rules. The pier was the one place in the Bay Area that didn't require a fishing license, so it was nice to see families out there, enjoying themselves, with crab nets, boom boxes, and coolers full of drinks.

Walking along the pier, I never saw the same atmosphere twice. San Francisco weather is mercurial, changing minute to minute. It wasn't uncommon to walk along the pier, fog so thick, you couldn't see the Golden Gate Bridge. On some days you couldn't see twenty feet in front of you.

Friends and I would walk along the pier from time to time; people who were visiting from other places, girlfriends, visitors, family. I'd sometimes strike up conversations with strangers. One example can be found in the spoken word piece "San Francisco" from All The Best, Isaac Hayes; a British tourist and I struck up a conversation:

"A fisherman threw the seagull an anchovy and another seagull chewed it up and spit it down the disabled seagull's beak. The helpless seagull did one last soar and landed in the bay.
My shoulders slumped and I said to a middle-aged British tourist next to me. "I guess he'll be part of the food chain." He and I then talked about how we eat animals that we hoped were treated humanely. Then I interrupted him, "Wow, we're two old white dudes, patting ourselves on the back, who are we kidding? Every animal we eat is killed against their will."
Then we talked about plastic and how we grew up with plastic and how now we're told not to use plastic anymore and right there before our eyes was the reason that plastic is slowly being phased out. I'm going fishing tomorrow; I hope someone invents some sort of eco-friendly fishing line. Maybe they already have, I'll have to ask around."

The pier goes way out there. From the west side of the pier, there was a clear view of the Golden Gate Bridge, depending on the amount of fog. On the northeast side of the pier, is Alcatraz. The prison never interested me visually, so I've never taken a photo if it.

Most of my walks along the pier have been on my own. Sometimes I'd walk from my place in Nob Hill, to The Marina, then all the way to the end of the pier, then back home. When I got into my fifties and felt more tired, I'd at least make a point to leave my place and walk all the way to the end of the pier and back.

During COVID 2020, the bleakest year of my life, I didn't spend every day in San Francisco, but when I did, no matter what, I'd make it a goal to get out and walk to the end of the pier and back. It was a deeply depressing year, due to the lack of work, plus six feet of distance, plus people sick with COVID; some of whom passed, including my aunt and friends including Hal Willner. Watching so many of my favorite places including restaurants and my favorite dry cleaner shut down permanently was insult to injury.

The pier was something I could rely on. Every day, as a goal, I'd walk out there to take one single photo and send it to my friend Theresa, in Ohio, who was also in her own COVID-related funk. 

Oddly, I know of people who had "the best year of their lives" that year, loving the COVID money that was coming in, taking trips across the county (paid for by their COVID checks), and of course some people who were "raking in the money" depending on their line of work.

For the most part, many people I knew were having a tough time that year. My artist friends were at the bottom of the barrel of who was considered "essential." I played one show that year, a COVID guidelined show at Henry Miller Library in Big Sur. Caroline was one of the handful of people who got me through the year. She'd get me out of the house and we'd take interesting road trips to places like Locke, Isleton and Donner Pass.

I recorded Welcome to Sparks, Nevada, throughout the first half of the year. “Hugo” was written about a charismatic fisherman we’d met during the trip to Isleton who was fishing along the Delta. I’ll never forget that day and how kind he was, explaining the history of Isleton; crawfish boils of the past, floods, and how the town became a borderline ghost town, causing the police department to close down.

We spent a lot of time on picnic benches eating take-out. Sun Kil Moon Lunch in the Park is a concept album about the last six months of COVID 2020. If you look at the cover, with the yellow bench in Aquatic Park, you can see the Aquatic Park Pier in the background.

I think it may have been Grace Slick who said, "I don't love things that can't love me back." Whether it loved me back or not, I loved Aquatic Park Pier.

More than anything, I enjoyed the walk. To be able to walk all the way to the end of the pier gave me a perspective of the bay that I can't get from my living room window. Seeing barges go by was always a highlight. If material things can be best friends, Aquatic Park Pier has been one of mine since the inception of my days in San Francisco.  

Now that the pier is closed - with its gate locked and chained and the KEEP OUT sign - it feels like I'm visiting a friend's grave. Why the pier is closed, I don't know, and I don't want to know.

The "Lemon Balm" video was filmed there, the "Onward" video was filmed there, and most importantly, I've taken countless photos of the pier and from the pier. Some of my most tranquil moments in life have been spent there. The pier's inspiration can be found in songs of mine like "Beautiful You," "My Brother Loves Seagulls" and "Couch Potato."

I've not looked up the history of the pier. One day I might, but not today.

"Everyday, for miles I walk along the Monterey Pines in the Marina to Aquatic Park, and I look out at the Marin Headlands and Tiburon and Sausalito and Angel Island, from the end of a fishing pier and Oh my lord, I couldn’t ask for more, my eyes couldn’t ever want for more, and oh, oh my, I watch the seagulls fly, for half my life I’ve watched ferry boats and the barges go by"

—From "Somehow the Wonder of Life Prevails."