Pope Valley Winery

What a hidden gem! Such a great winery with so much history! Here's the catch though - you've got to drive a ways to get there so make it an early tasting but it's worth it once you get there. I felt like we had driven back in time to what Napa valley had been 40 years ago - such a cool experience.

Our tasting included a tour of the facility, which was built in the late 1800's. I loved that the tasting room felt so original - not one of the new modern places you see so much of in the area. We enjoyed their wines a lot and ended up purchasing their reserve Sauvignon blanc - and we are red drinkers!

Great experience!

Wow we love Pope Valley cab! After a tasting a while back we purchased a case of their reserve cab. Well last time we were out we purchased some wine and without naming names it was sub-par. Well this time we brought one of our Pope Valley cab!

We had a great time at PVW. We were hosted by Eli as well as the cats Sam & Ed. It takes a while to get our here from Calistoga, St. Helena, or Napa, but it was well worth the trip. I told Eli while we were there that it was super nice to get away from the general pretentiousness of the valley wineries. He was very informative/educational, but not so... icky about it. You get so much fluff and whatnot at a typical wine tasting like that winery is bottling the actual wine that will save the planet from destruction or something.

Eli was cool and funny. He asked us questions about our tastes and made some suggestions based on those after our tasting. We had a SUPER laid-back and relaxing time. We wandered around the property. We visited the old olive tree, the vineyards, the old 3-story buildings on the property, and even had a nice little (very short) hike around the land. We did a lot of tastings in various cities and all 4 of us agreed that Eli was the best host we had because he made us feel like family.

The farm is really neat and looks like an amazing place to hold a wedding or party. LOVED IT.

The wine was delicious and we took a few bottles home with us. If you're a port drinker, they have a Zin Port that my wife (the family port lover) really enjoyed, although it was unlike any port she'd ever had before.

We happened to have spare time between the two wineries we had appointments for so we decided to take a chance and stop into Pope Valley Winery. We were greeted by Eli. We tasted in a private cottage with a dining room table.

I'm so glad that we decided to stop by. Eli gave us a generous tastings of their wines and then took us on a tour of the property. The tour was a standout for our Sunday wine tastings.

We saw the picnic area with cute lights. The actual tasting room that was cozy and then we moved onto the barrel room. Because it was raining we could see and hear the water seeping thru the limestone. Then we went to the barn house and got more history on the winery.

I had a really lovely Saturday afternoon here. We were taking a break from a weekend at Harbin Hot Springs to explore the town of Middletown. This place wasn't on our itinerary but the shop owner at Koontz Mercantile insisted this would be a great place to go, so we took the beautiful winding drive to this idyllic place (about 15-20 minutes from Middletown). We sat under the shade of an ancient majestic oak tree and tasted several wines while enjoying the sunshine, the breeze, and a picnic lunch we had packed. There were other guests, but not many. It was a nice change from other places I've been like Coppola or Castelo d'Amoroso. Our wine tender was so nice and knowledgeable. I'm sorry that I've forgotten her name! There were 2 wine tenders and both helped us at some point, the 2 seemed to be a great team running a well oiled machine.

At the end of our tasting we took a tour around the property. It was crazy to learn that this was the oldest winery in the area and many of the original, hand- built buildings were still there -- including the hand dug wine cellar. There's a small creek that runs through the property, under the buildings, which adds to the charm.

We had a really nice time here and would definitely go back!

This is my first time doing the Napa Valley winery. We visited 3 wineries today and this was by far the best vibe of all three. They accommodated all our requests including smoking a cigar while wine tasting. Our host was Eli Moore and he did an outstanding job. This was a great vibe all the way around. I would recommend this winery to anyone visiting for winery needs.

Using our Calistoga wine passport to try the place out. Great everyday drinking type wine. Friendly service. Great outdoor space. But off the beaten path. Nice history. Got to try their port as well and took a tour of the wine cave. Walked away with two bottles of wine.

What a beautiful place!
Thank you Eli for making our visit so enjoyable.
Great wine, excellent service, friendly people.
We will be back!

Pope Valley Winery is a gem! We visited Pope Valley because our out-of-town guest wanted to do a wine tour, and we found Pope Valley to be affordable and thought the cave was unique.

Instantly after stepping out of our car, you could feel the upbeat energy that this winery has. There's lots of outside seating, games (I remember corn hole and large Jenga), a "petting" area for some of their vines, and clean bathrooms. Kristen was an excellent host. She was extremely knowledgeable and answered all of our questions (which were plentiful, lol). She also gave us a vineyard tour, which was neat! This place has a lot of history and uses a cave to age its wine.

All the wines we tasted were delicious, and we'll definitely be bringing more friends here.

A couple of things to note: We had a reservation, but it didn't seem too busy. Also, we were running a little late and tried calling to update them, and we could not get through to anyone despite trying several times. Email might be a better way to contact them if needed.

We couldn't have had a better time here. We found this place on a tasting passport and will definitely be back. The service was amazing and so so welcoming. We were hungry by this point on our trip so we were thrilled that they had a cheese and salami plate for $20. Great value, great wines, great experience.

Also check out the hub cap "museum" just down the road.