10 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM Redwood City was the last place you’d expect to find a yacht club. And yet, following decades of redevelopment, I had to rely on GPS to find my way through once familiar territory en route to an exquisite dinner at Hurrica restaurant in Westpoint Harbor. In this issue, we talk with Mark Sanders, the man who envisioned this sparkling marina, and spent years navigating through a sea of regulatory obstacles to get it built. (Page 100) This month, you’ll also discover the story behind two other passion projects—the musical merger that became husbandand-wife country duo Haley & Michaels (Page 23) and Abby Ahrens, the Francophile behind the whimsically decorated Enchanté Boutique Hotel in Los Altos. (Page 76) Speaking of decorating, read about the global perspective that enriches world traveler Kanika BakshiKhurana’s flair for creating interiors that make you feel right at home. (Page 69) Tantalize your taste buds with a trip to Carmel, home to a couple of culinary all-stars located just a few blocks from each other. (Page 36). Take home a taste of Italy from Che Fico Mercato in Menlo Park (Page 60) and meet the young chef at the helm of the iconic Flea Street Cafe. (Page 53) You’ll also find a fresh take on downtown Burlingame (Page 44) and more in our August issue. Here’s to the fair winds and following seas of summer! Andrea Gemmet andrea@punchmonthly.com {editor’s note} patiently taught us to tell port from starboard, to always keep the lines neatly coiled and to cast off without falling into the murky water that teemed with algae and tiny fish. I don’t think my brother and sister and I would ever claim to be skilled sailors, but we quickly absorbed the most important lessons: how to avoid getting knocked over by the boom, how to steer between the channel’s buoys so you don’t run aground and to never, ever fall off the boat. That last lesson came courtesy of my dad’s “man overboard drills,” which were conducted whenever his hat blew off. The drills always resulted in the hat having an unscheduled burial at sea before we were able to come about and maneuver close enough to grab it before it sank. Every time he lost another one and I looked into my siblings’ eyes, I knew we were thinking the same thing: I never want to be in that hat’s position. We kids did a fair amount of complaining about losing a precious Saturday to the sailboat when we could have been lazing around the house but the truth was, the minute we got underway, we loved it. Skimming across the choppy water, bumping over a bigger boat’s wake, sprawled on the deck with the sea spray in my face—it was heaven. Years later, when my dad finally sold it to some other starry-eyed sucker, I was left with a little boat-shaped hole in my life. I have no aspirations of owning a boat myself, but I jump at the chance to spend a day on the water in anything that floats (preferably with sails). The harbor of my youth was a workaday place, pungent and rough around the edges. When I was a kid, my sensible dad did a crazy thing. He bought a boat. I wasn’t old enough to know exactly how he got my mother on board with the idea, but I’ll bet it was similar to how Mom ended up the proud owner of a horse when she was a girl: years of wheedling finally paid off. And just as fiercely as my mother loved horses, my father loved sailing. He’d learned how to sail as a teen and dreamed of one day having a boat of his own. When a colleague decided to sell his Catalina 22, the tides turned and suddenly, we were a family with a sailboat. Most weekends during sailing season, when the winds were fair and the tides in our favor, we’d pack up lunch and head to the Port of Redwood City. Dad ABOVE: Rich Gemmet at the helm of his beloved Catalina 22.
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