Quick Take:
On Thursday morning, coastal storm surges damaged waterfront restaurants in Capitola and Aptos. Less than a year ago, the same businesses required lengthy repairs after similar storms caused major destruction.
Storm surges along the coast Thursday damaged waterfront restaurants in Capitola Village, Rio Del Mar and Santa Cruz, many of which experienced similar damage and long closures as the result of severe storms in January.
One Capitola business damaged in January had yet to reopen. Patrick Lunn, owner of Bay Bar & Grill, a restaurant on the Esplanade in Capitola Village, had just submitted the final application to the City of Capitola to inspect the floors of his restaurant. He was there until 9:30 p.m. Wednesday, putting up shelves, and expected to finally welcome customers in early January after more than a year.
But a wave surged under the waterfront restaurant Thursday morning, buckling the new floors “right down the middle.”
“I had just laid down brand-new floors. I thought that was the least of my concerns,” Lunn said. “They buckled up like an A-frame.”
Bay Bar & Grill has been closed since the storms last January because the repairs required new construction by the city and had to be re-permitted. The process took almost a year.
Now, the floors need to be replaced again, which Lunn estimated could take three to four weeks. If there are foundational issues, it could take much longer.
“It’s very disheartening,” Lunn said. “But this business is all that I have so I have to keep at it.”
Zelda’s On The Beach manager Josh Whitby, whose wife, Jill Ealy, owns the restaurant, observed the storm with members of the Capitola Department of Public Works early Thursday morning. Things looked OK at first, Whitby said, but around 7 a.m. they became concerned when the surge became more intense than anticipated.
The forecast called for 20- to 25-foot waves, but the tide was higher than expected, and the waves were bigger and rolling in tighter sets.
“We heard 20- to 25-footers, but that was supposed to be coming off of Pleasure Point, and should have dissipated by the time it got to us,” said Whitby. “But it didn’t.”
Around 7:30 am, Whitby rushed to Home Depot and quickly built shutters to protect the restaurant’s windows as the tide rolled around his feet.
By mid-afternoon, Zelda’s sustained minor damage – nothing like the destruction it endured in January. One section of the railing along its beachfront dining area was knocked away by a staircase that broke off of the Capitola Wharf, Whitby said. An outdoor bussing station was destroyed by water pressure but can be repaired.
At My Thai Beach, located next door to Zelda’s, an exterior wall was damaged but the interior of the restaurant was unharmed. Pronpimol “Pinky” Suwonsupar, who runs the restaurant with her son, Dominick King, told Lookout she was worried that the exterior ocean-facing window of the restaurant could be destroyed in the high surf expected over the next couple of days.
The Esplanade in Capitola Village remained closed to cars into Thursday afternoon as crews worked to respond to the damage from localized flooding, according to the Capitola Police Department.
Zelda’s will remain closed through the weekend until the storm passes completely. Said Whitby: “I won’t pull my shutters until at least Sunday because I don’t want to have to rebuild in splashing waves again.”
In Aptos, water flowed over the parking lot on the Rio Del Mar Esplanade and into Venus Spirits Cocktails & Kitchen Beachside early Thursday morning. The restaurant, which reopened in July after a six-months-long remodel, was closed until further notice. The neighboring café, Venus Pie Trap, was also closed.
Owner Sean Venus was inside his restaurant when a huge swell smashed against the windows at 8 a.m. Thankfully, there were no large objects in the water, he said, otherwise the wave could have broken through the windows.
He was there with the restaurant’s morning prep crew, who were baking bread and preparing for service. At 7 a.m., a baker contacted Venus to say that the storm was getting rough. Venus arrived at 7:30 a.m., and about 30 minutes later the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office issued an evacuation warning. He and the employee were preparing to leave when the wave hit the front of the building. Thankfully, no one was hurt and they quickly evacuated out of the back of the restaurant.
The swells were much more intense than predicted. Dirt and water entered the building and broke the planter boxes in the front of Venus Beachside, but there’s no structural damage, said Venus. “A couple large waves pushed debris and sand into the parking lot and patio, but crews are already down here doing clean up,” Venus told Lookout on Thursday afternoon. “We’re already in a much better situation than last year.”
Venus Beachside will remain closed until he can assess and repair the damage. The restaurant asked community members who want to support it to visit its sister restaurant on the Westside in Santa Cruz, Venus Spirits Cocktails & Kitchen.
With rain and more coastal surges expected Friday and Saturday, Venus is working on barricading the restaurant. “We had sandbags up,” he said. “But the waves came and tore right through them.”
—Lookout’s Kevin Painchaud contributed to this report.
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