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Napa Valley Wineries - Napa Wine
Wineries in Napa Valley
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Over 600 Napa Valley wineries are integrated into our winery directory.
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The Napa Valley wine region is located 50 miles north of San Francisco, California, and is recognized as North America’s premium wine-growing region. Internationally it is known as one of the world's great wine regions. Napa Valley covers 225,300 acres of land and produces just four percent of the total wine grown in California each year. The Napa Valley wine region stretches approximately 30 miles in a northwest direction with its width ranging from five miles at the widest point near the city of Napa to just a mile where the valley narrows near the town of Calistoga. More than 500 wineries are located within Napa Valley, making this valley the most intensely concentrated wine region in the world. Mountains bound the Napa Valley on both sides with low volcanic hills defining its borders. Bisecting Napa Valley wine region is the Napa River that tracks the valley's narrowed shape, and fades from a fully navigable river in its southern stretches to a small creek at its northern beginnings. Napa Valley's gentle climate favors the production of wine grapes and a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. The suitability of growing wine grapes is what makes the Napa Valley very unique. Its maritime climate produces cool nights and warm days and combines with soils that are deep and moderately fertile to yield wine grapes that are singular in their intensity, complexity and balance. Several different microclimates and a wide array of soil profiles symbolize that different vineyards produce grapes that are unique in style and character but uniformly high in quality.
The vineyard environments of the Napa Valley have evolved through geologic time. Like the rest of California, Napa Valley has had a very active geologic history. A uniquely diverse winegrowing appellation, the Napa Valley formed much like the rest of the North Coast through a geological evolution active with colliding tectonic plates, volcanic activity and changes in sea level as water alternately advanced and retreated over the southern end of the valley several times. As a result of these geological events that took place over a 60-million-year history, the Napa Valley has soils of volcanic, maritime and alluvial origin, with more than 30 different types identified.
The Napa Valley is itself an appellation. Within the Napa Valley appellation exists 14 sub appellations, including: Atlas Peak, Chiles Valley District, Diamond Mountain District, Howell Mountain, Los Carneros, Mt. Veeder, Oakville, Rutherford, St. Helena, Spring Mountain District, Stags Leap District, Yountville, Wild Horse Valley and Oak Knoll District of Napa Valley. The Calistoga appellation is still pending approval.
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