About Wine Country

The San Francisco Bay Area is home to three major wine-making regions:

• Napa Valley
• Sonoma
• Santa Cruz and Monterey

Napa Valley

Often affectionately referred to as a modern-day Eden, Northern California's Napa Valley is beyond doubt the most famous winegrowing region in America. Just 30 miles long and a few miles wide, the geographically striking swath of land is home to hundreds of wineries – some stunning, some simple, many simply over the top - that produce wines proven to stand proudly alongside the top wines of the world. And while Napa's stellar reputation was inarguably built on the merits of its elegant Chardonnay and expressive Cabernet Sauvignon, many other grapes call the valley home and indeed thrive in its fertile soils.

Sonoma

If a wine region could be compared to a sumptuous buffet where every mouthwatering option looks as good as the last, it would be Northern California’s Sonoma County. Comprising more than 200,000 acres of varied terrain between the Pacific Ocean and the Mayacamas Mountains, Sonoma is a region as renowned for its sheer size as for its remarkable diversity. Boasting no fewer than 12 sub-appellations, a dizzying array of grape varieties produced and a colorful winemaking past that pre-dates the Mission era, Sonoma offers visitors a wealth of opportunities to expand their vinous horizons against the backdrop of one of the world’s most dynamic wine regions.

Santa Cruz and Monterey

Today, Monterey is much more of a city than a town - not to mention home to an internationally acclaimed aquarium - and its surrounding countryside boasts some of California's most prolific winegrowing vineyards. Encompassing the nearby Salinas and Carmel valleys, as well as the up-and-coming Santa Lucia Highlands AVA, Monterey County offers visitors much to see in the way of countryside, and a wide variety of wines to sample along the way.

Summaries borrowed from WineCountry.com