Crockett is a small town with an oversized pull. Its intriguing history threads through the cross-Pacific sugar trade, perilous smelting of precious metals and strange crimes involving an “Ocean’s Eleven”-style gold heist and intricate networks of underground smuggling tunnels.
With charming restaurants and a bustling music scene, it’s also a great place to have a day trip. But where to begin?
Filling up the caffeine reserves is obviously Priority No. 1 for many folks. In town, the new Calaca Coffee pours strong java with a Mexican twist. Try a cafe de olla cold brew with cinnamon and piloncillo (raw sugar) syrup or a Xoco latte with cacao and espresso – and if you’re feeling naughty, top it off with banana or tres-leches cream.
Glommed onto an old church like a retro barnacle, Revival Coffee farther down the road is a trailer-based operation with a bohemian feel thanks to an open-air porch with comfy furniture and board games. “Liquid pie” is a good way to describe the coffee. There’s a Cherry Jubilee with white chocolate, a Coconut Cream Pie Latte and a Huckleberry Mocha, giving customers the chance to slyly comment to their significant others: “No, you’re MY huckleberry.” The fruit-forward drinks seem cast down from the berry-rich fields of Oregon, and for a breakfast snack there’s biscuits and gravy.
An Amtrak train speeds past the C & H Sugar Factory in Crockett, Calif., on Sunday, June 15, 2025. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)The sweet offerings around town seem appropriate given its raison d’etre for a long while was sugar. The California and Hawaiian (C&H) Sugar Refining Company will celebrate its 120th year in Crockett – also called “Sugar City” – in 2026. While it recently stopped importing from Hawaii, it’s still a major player in the market, producing 14 percent of the cane sugar in the United States. In local vintage shops you’ll find its logo emblazoned on Hawaiian shirts, also in timeworn cookbooks with recipes like Hawaiian coconut pudding and frosted grapes on pine boughs.
Hungry for more history? Head down to the Crockett Historical Museum squeezed into a former railroad station by the C&H factory. (Note it’s closed for repairs until July 7.) Inside you’ll find treasures like California’s last telephone switchboard and a 468-pound taxidermied sturgeon, the largest ever caught in San Pablo Bay. There are informative news articles like one whose headline reads, “UFOs Buzz Crockett Six Say Soberly.”
That’s probably not true – the “soberly” part, as Crockett is a historical hotbed of drinking activity. Among the 45-plus bars that hung their flag in this tiny community during the last century were Chuck & Henry, Dick & Johnny, Toots and Gully and the by-comparison-lonely-sounding Ray’s Corner, which poured booze for 103 years until closing in 2004.
A train transporting wine stopped in Crockett in 1920, the year Prohibition started. The result was like something out of “28 Days Later” with alcohol-enjoying locals scenting blood in the air. “When the car was discovered on a recent Sunday many of the populace dashed madly to the railroad yards equipped with spigots, garden hose and hand axes,” the Los Angeles Herald reported at the time. “The car was entered and some 3000 gallons siphoned into buckets, bottles, kegs, demijohns and all manner of containers.”
There’s fun history to be gleaned here about the old Selby smelting works, once the largest refining company in the West for gold, silver and lead. It was bulldozed in the 1970s, but locals keep it alive sharing fond memories on the public Crockett-history Facebook page. “When you woke up there was always a layer of gray dust on the porches,” recalls one person. Laments another: “[M]y great grandfather fell into a smelting pot I believe never made it home soo sad.”
A woman walks her dog outside Toot's Tavern in Crockett, Calif., on Sunday, June 15, 2025. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Selby was the scene of one of the biggest gold heists in contemporary U.S. history. In 1901, a former worker named Jack Winters spent 6 weeks tunneling through dirt and brick to reach the company’s metal-lined vault, where he absconded with half a ton of gold bullion. He lowered the treasure into the muck of the Carquinez Strait, planning to retrieve it bit by bit. Instead, he was quickly caught and divers recovered the haul, though that doesn’t stop fortune-hunters from seeking remnants to this day.
A nice way to burn off some calories, then pack them back on, is to visit Crockett Hills Regional Park. From the staging area, the Crockett Ranch Trail trail leads up a beautifully forested trek to a tunnel under the Cummings Skyway. Pass through this dark orifice and you’ll emerge on the other side of the hill with blazing sun and panoramic visage of the San Francisco Bay that can only be called stunning. The random cow that sometimes grazes here might agree with an appreciative bellow.
The sun peaks through the trees along Edwards Creek Trail at Crockett Hills Regional Park in Crockett, Calif., on Saturday, Oct. 12, 2019. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group) (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Cocktail hour is probably approaching, and beckoning hard is the surf-and-turf institution The Dead Fish. Supposedly named after a quirk of the owner’s nonna – she couldn’t remember names of the sea creatures she cooked, so called everything “dead fish” – the restaurant offers roasted Dungeness crab and Omaha prime rib in a kitsch-filled compound on the cliff. The views of huge ships passing through the Strait are unbeatable, as are the “Drink-Like-a-Fish” cocktails for only $10. A Crabby Mood Martini or Bloody Shark served in a chilled wine glass? Delightful!
Many of Crockett’s hidden charms reveal themselves by wandering with no real purpose. The Epperson Gallery is a spacious showcase for California landscapes and quirky animal sculptures. You might learn that the Cat Vintage shop plans to open a Cat Museum this summer, full of priceless antiques – to cat lovers – like feline dolls, trinkets, shirts, staplers and more Garfields than you can shake a lasagna at. Ask nicely and the owner might pull back the curtain on the in-progress museum.
Artist Jeffrey Tover is photographed with one of his paintings on display at Epperson Gallery in Crockett, Calif., on Sunday, June 15, 2025. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Club Tac is a sleepy dive bar with drink specials and a wall of certificates that, upon closer inspection, turn out to be from E Clampus Vitus, a men’s-only organization devoted to the history of the Western Gold Rush. Among its purported members was Gene Autry, Ronald Reagan and the famous San Francisco eccentric Emperor Norton.
For dinner, The Sicilian serves up traditional Italian plates like penne amatriciana or antipasti with burrata-stracciatella and marinated artichokes. The restaurant may or may not be named in tribute to the eponymous 1987 movie starring local tough-guy actor Aldo Ray.
Lucia’s Craft Sandwich closes in the afternoon, but if you were fortunate enough to pick something up they’re sizable enough for a dinner. It’s no exaggeration to say it’s one of the best sandwich shops in the Bay, focused on local produce and top-quality meats. The mortadella with artichokes and fresh ricotta dances between delicate and decadent, and the specials are always worth consideration: a porchetta with orange and fennel-pollen salad, say, or a croque madame with Mornay sauce, squash blossoms and a runny egg.
A Genoa Salami sandwich is photographed at Lucia's Craft Sandwich in Crockett, Calif., on Sunday, June 15, 2025. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Crockett may have had dozens of bars in its history but today is down to a handful, a great one being Toot’s Tavern. Said to be the longest continuously operating bar in Contra Costa County, the wood-shrouded watering hole switches from sleepy neighborhood hangout during the day to high-energy music venue at night. Patrons might stumble upon a thrash-metal band, a Van Halen tribute, an electro DJ or a 17-piece jazz ensemble – anything’s possible here.
There’s also said to be a tunnel in Toot’s basement that smugglers used during Prohibition to get resupplies from the waterfront. Some locals think it’s a myth, but a bartender swears it’s true.
“All of Crockett has tunnels under it,” he said on a recent visit. “There were tons of bars during Prohibition and you can see the holes open up by the water. Most are bricked over, and I wouldn’t recommend seeking them out. Yeah, it’s kind of a weird old town.”
Joe Kaline sings as Eric Eidbo plays the trumpet while performing at Toot's Tavern in Crockett, Calif., on Sunday, June 15, 2025. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)IF YOU GO…
Calaca Coffee: Open 7 a.m.- 2 p.m. at 605 Second Ave., Crockett; calacacoffee.com
Revival Coffee: Open 5 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 6 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and 7 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday at 1 Rolph Park Drive, Crockett; therevivalcoffeeco.com
Crockett Historical Museum: Closed until July 7, then open 10 a.m.-3 p.m. Wednesday and Saturday at 900 Loring Ave., Crockett; crockettmuseum.org
Crockett Hills Regional Park: Summer hours through August are 8 a.m.-8 p.m. daily at 1300 Crockett Blvd., Crockett; ebparks.org/parks/crockett-hills
The Dead Fish: Open noon-9:30 daily (last seating 8 p.m.) at 20050 San Pablo Ave., Crockett; thedeadfish.com
Epperson Gallery: Open 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Friday-Sunday at 1400 Pomona St., Crockett; eppersongallery.com
The Cat Vintage: Open noon-6 p.m. Friday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday and 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday at 720 2nd Ave., Crockett; thecatvintage.com
The Sicilian: Open 6 p.m.-9 p.m. Thursday-Sunday at 601 2nd Ave., Crockett; thesiciliancrockett.com
Lucia’s Craft Sandwich: Open 8 a.m.-3 p.m. Monday-Thursday and 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Friday-Sunday at 611 2nd Ave., Crockett; luciascraftsandwich.com
Toot’s Tavern: Open noon-1:30 a.m. daily at 627 2nd Ave., Crockett; tootstavern.com
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