When we spend a day wine tasting in the Napa Valley, we like to make it a long, slow, relaxing day. We pace ourselves as we make our way to three or four wineries. Part of the pacing is the wine country picnic. It is one of the highlights of our wine country getaway. We like to spend a good hour or more enjoying our lunch and sipping a delicious glass of Napa Valley wine.
Finding a good picnic winery in the Napa Valley is not easy. There are 400 or so wineries in the Napa Valley and only a very small percentage of them have a legal picnic area. By legal, we mean they have a permit that allows picnicking on their premises. Because of various ordinances passed by the County, a winery in Napa Valley is suppose to be a just that, a place where wine is produced. Really? We have been to many wineries in Napa Valley where it is somewhat questionable as to what they really are all about. Some tasting rooms are just loaded with merchandise such as clothes, gourmet food items, and works of art. We even saw some business books in one winery’s tasting room.
In most other counties like Sonoma, Mendocino, and Paso Robles, it is very common for wineries to have picnic facilities. In fact, they seem to encourage folks to bring a lunch and picnic.
We also have been faked out by a few Napa wineries. They have picnic tables scattered around the premises, but when we inquired about picnicking, we have been told that they do not have a picnic permit. The tables are for special events or for the staff. We also have been to wineries, mostly hidden ones, that have told us they don’t have a permit for picnicking but, “go ahead and picnic, nobody checks.”
Here is our list of favorite picnic spots in the Napa Valley. We have been to each one of these at least once, most of them several times. We hope they all have permits.
Pine Ridge
Robert Sinskey
Rutherford Hill
Summers
Larson Family Winery (Carneros)
Bouchaine (Carneros)
Chateau Potelle
Reynolds Family Winery
Casa Nuestra
See Wine Country Getaways for a complete list of Napa Valley wine trails.
Of course there is always one important rule in effect. If you are going to enjoy a glass of wine, for goodness sake make sure you are drinking wine from that winery.
The Good: Picnicking among the vineyards is the perfect escape.
The Bad: There are only a handful of wineries in Napa Valley with picnic facilities
