The Santa Cruz Mountains Wine Weekend You Haven't Taken Yet
A Wine Region That Keeps Its Head Down
The Santa Cruz Mountains AVA doesn't have the name recognition of Napa or Sonoma, and most of the people who make wine up here seem fine with that. The region runs from the hills above Silicon Valley south through Bonny Doon to the mountains east of Santa Cruz, and the wines it produces—Pinot Noir and Chardonnay primarily, some Cabernet Sauvignon at the right elevations—have a quality that comes from the combination of marine influence, elevation, and soils that can't quite be replicated anywhere else. There are more than 60 wineries in the appellation now, and spending a day or a weekend going through a few of them is one of the more underrated things you can do up here.
Beauregard Vineyards, Bonny Doon
The Beauregard family's connection to winemaking in Bonny Doon goes back to 1949, when retired Sheriff's deputy Amos Beauregard planted 13 acres of Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, and Cabernet Sauvignon on what's now the family ranch. Beauregard Vineyards at 10 Pine Flat Road sits in the redwood hills above Highway 1, with a view that earns the drive. They're open most days, which makes them a reliable stop. The Pinot they're known for has that high-elevation quality that makes Santa Cruz Mountains wine worth seeking out—restrained, earthy, genuinely interesting.
Big Basin Vineyards, Boulder Creek
The tasting room at Big Basin Vineyards used to be a Grace Episcopal Church—the original architecture has been preserved, which gives the space a calm, almost meditative quality that suits a wine tasting well. It's in the hills above Boulder Creek, and getting there requires some winding, which is part of the experience. The wines here have a devoted following among people who like Pinot with texture and age-worthiness. It pairs well with having driven past redwoods to get there.
Bonny Doon Vineyard
Randall Grahm founded Bonny Doon Vineyard in 1983 and spent several decades making some of California's most eccentric and philosophically interesting wine—the kind where the back label has a manifesto and the name 'Le Cigare Volant' refers to a French ordinance banning flying saucers from landing in vineyards. If you appreciate wine that has a point of view about what it's doing in the world, this is worth knowing about. Check current hours and tasting room location before you go, as these have evolved over the years.
Ahlgren Vineyard
One of the smaller, more under-the-radar producers in the region, Ahlgren has been making wine in the Santa Cruz Mountains since the 1970s. It's the kind of producer that serious wine people seek out specifically because it hasn't been discovered in the glossy-magazine sense. Small production, long track record, genuine connection to the land.
Putting Together a Day
The Santa Cruz Mountains wine country doesn't have a Healdsburg town square with tasting rooms cheek-by-jowl. The wineries are spread across the hills, connected by winding mountain roads, and getting between them takes longer than a map suggests. That's actually a feature if you're thinking of it as an afternoon to inhabit rather than a checklist to complete. A realistic day hits two or three places, with lunch somewhere in between—Scopazzi's in Boulder Creek, or a picnic pulled together from the Felton Farmers Market, depending on your direction and pace.
For people considering buying up here, a wine country day is also just a good way to spend time in the region and see parts of it you might not see otherwise. The Bonny Doon area, the Ridge Road that runs the spine between the valley and the coast—these are the kinds of roads that explain why people choose to live here. If you're exploring and want local knowledge about what to see while you're up in the mountains, feel free to ask.