According to an NPR interview with his guitarist, Steve Cropper, Redding began writing the song when he played at the Fillmore West in December 1966, but most accounts line up his time in Sausalito with a six-night string of shows at the jazz club Basin Street West in North Beach in August 1967. Legend has it that the dock where he watched the tide roll away was right here in Sausalito. But he never had the chance, dying in a tragic plane crash just days after the recording session in 1967 at the age of 26.Ī view of part of the houseboat community in Sausalito, Calif., in the late 1960s. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts, and today, it has nearly 350 million plays on Spotify alone, more than double Redding's second-most popular song, “Stand by Me.” The iconic whistling at the end was originally intended as a placeholder, which the singer planned to re-record in a final version. Recorded in late 1967 and released in 1968, it jumped to No. “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” is inarguably Otis Redding’s biggest hit. And at least one of them claims to have seen it being written, 54 years ago. I doubt the sound carried to the rows of houseboats on either side, but almost every resident of the 282 floating homes at these docks would’ve known the song. Something like a seagull squawked in the distance while I whistled a little tune. Under the clear skies of a Sunday afternoon, I took a seat at a wooden lookout point along the water. But next to the colorful bungalows and rusty barges, floating modern mansions remind you this is indeed 2021. The pastel paint jobs and streamers hanging from balconies invokes a festive New Orleans vibe. There’s a little stand outside one boat selling art postcards on the honor system.
A longboarder in wraparound sunglasses skates down the dock to his houseboat, pulled by his leashed golden retriever.
In some ways, time feels frozen at Waldo Point Harbor in Sausalito. A view from a lookout point at the Waldo Point Harbor in Sausalito, Calif., where Otis Redding conceived the song "(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay." Dan Gentile
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