Robert Mondavi Winery reopened its Oakville estate on April 20, 2026, after a three-year, roughly $200 million renovation — the most significant change to the property since architect Cliff May built its Mission-style arch and tower in 1966. This is the story of a Napa Valley trip built around that reopening, nine years overdue, and around Charles Krug, the 1861 winery where Robert Mondavi first learned to make wine before striking out on his own.

Napa Valley is a trough between two mountain ranges that didn’t rise at the same time. The Vaca Range, on the east, pushed up first — roughly three million years ago, as the Pacific plate ground north against the continent. The Mayacamas came later, on the west, still rising today at about half a millimeter a year. Everything in between — the benchlands, the valley floor, the vines — is built from what those two ranges have been shedding onto each other ever since. I didn’t know any of that the last time I stood in a vineyard. I know it now, and it’s changed the way I walk through one.

The last time I was immersed in wine country like this, I was in Mendoza, in the shadow of the Andes, watching how deliberately a place becomes a bottle — the soil, the elevation, the dozen small decisions a grower makes before a grape is ever picked. That trip sealed something. Then came a second child, a third, and nine years in which the Napa trip I kept meaning to take kept not happening. When we finally turned off Highway 29 and saw the first rows of vines, I understood how long I’d been waiting without quite admitting it.

Touring Napa Valley

What surprised me first was the scale. Downtown Napa is compact enough to cross on foot between tastings, and several wineries sit close enough to their neighbors that you end up walking from one property directly into the next without planning to. We spent an afternoon doing exactly that — moving between tasting rooms as the light lowered and the day’s second and third pours started to blur pleasantly into each other. I don’t have a tidy word for that stretch of the afternoon. I don’t think it needs one.

I went into the Napa Valley Wine Train skeptical, outvoted by the rest of our group and expecting to spend a day feeling like a tourist. What changed my mind was the kitchen — a service galley the size of a closet, producing a full multi-course meal for a moving train, staffed by two chefs working in a footprint most restaurants would reject as a walk-in. The train stops at Charles Krug, founded in 1861 and still the oldest continuously operating winery in Napa Valley — and, as it turns out, the winery where a young Robert Mondavi learned the trade before a dispute with his brother Peter sent him out to build his own estate five years later, three miles down the road in Oakville. I didn’t know that history when we boarded. It reframed the entire next day.

The day that turned the trip into something more than a vacation was Oakville, at Robert Mondavi

The estate reopened in April 2026 after a three-year, roughly $200 million renovation timed to its sixtieth anniversary — the most significant rebuild since Cliff May designed the original Mission-style arch and tower in 1966, the first major winery built in Napa since Prohibition. Architects Aidlin Darling Design kept May’s arch and tower standing exactly where they’ve always stood and built a new hospitality wing beside them with an inverted gable roofline that echoes the original shape rather than competing with it. The bell tower — which for sixty years held nothing but storage — is now a tasting room built into the original structure, its shelving made from reclaimed wood, holding vintages that go back decades. The ceiling above the main tasting room is built from the staves of the winery’s own retired oak fermentation vats, turned stave-side up: the room is, quite literally, constructed from the winery’s own working history.

We arrived on my parents’ fortieth wedding anniversary. Before our reservation began, a member of staff met us with a pour of sparkling wine made from grapes grown at Robert Mondavi’s private residence — unprompted, and exactly right for the occasion. The garden ringing the estate is planted entirely in native species chosen for the region’s dry summers; no ornamentals standing in for water they can’t spare. My mother, who came to Napa a casual drinker, left having joined the mailing list before we’d finished the tasting.

The tasting itself moved chronologically — the history of the estate, the To Kalon vineyard beside it (440 acres, first planted in 1868, still one of the most sought-after sites in California), the specific choices behind each wine, food built to show what each bottle does under the right bite. I understood Cabernet differently by the end of it than I had at the start. The tour ended in the estate’s private library of archived bottles, each one dated back to a specific harvest, a specific year’s decisions.

I became a member before we left.

A Note to the House Reader Who Travels to Napa Valley

If you’re one who’s been telling yourself you need Burgundy or Tuscany before you’ve earned a real wine trip — you don’t. Napa’s Cabernets compete and win at the international level on their own terms, and the valley’s hospitality culture, built out from Mondavi’s own 1966 experiment in welcoming the public at all, has sixty years of practice behind it. Start here. The curiosity it opens — about soil, about what a place actually tastes like once you know its geology — doesn’t close once you’ve found it.

The Practical Details

Where to stay: Westin Verasa Napa — central, walking distance to downtown and Oxbow, with La Toque on-site for nights you don’t want to go anywhere else.

Getting around: Downtown Napa is genuinely walkable, built on the valley’s flattest ground. For the Oakville and Rutherford wineries, you’ll need a car or rideshare — Lyft operates reliably throughout the valley.

On reservations: Book the major estates — Mondavi especially — well in advance. Same-day calls work more often than websites suggest, particularly mid-week; ask directly whether a property will pour a glass without a full tasting commitment. Several will, and it isn’t listed anywhere online.

On timing: We visited in late May, just after Bottle Rock, and found the valley quieter and easier to move through without reservations than peak season allows. Late May through early June is worth planning around if flexibility matters to you.

One thing we’d do differently: Ask every winery, before you arrive, whether they’ll pour a glass on the grounds without a full booking. It’s the single detail that opens up spontaneous stops between scheduled tastings, and almost none of the wineries put it on their websites.

Want the full itinerary?

Krug and Mondavi are two stops of five. The rest of the trip — Rutherford’s alluvial-fan geology and the century-old farming families who work it, the reservation calls that open a valley most visitors never see past the tasting menu, and the exact five-day sequence we ran — is reserved for paid subscribers of The House on Substack.

Napa Valley Trip: Frequently Asked Questions

Is Robert Mondavi Winery open in 2026? Yes. The Oakville estate reopened to visitors on April 20, 2026, following a three-year renovation reported to cost roughly $200 million, timed to the winery’s sixtieth anniversary.

What is the oldest winery in Napa Valley? Charles Krug, founded in 1861 in St. Helena, is the oldest continuously operating winery in Napa Valley and the site of California’s first wine tasting room.

Who designed the Robert Mondavi Winery building? Architect Cliff May designed the winery’s Mission-style arch and tower in 1966. The recent renovation, led by architecture firm Aidlin Darling Design, restored rather than replaced them.

How is Robert Mondavi Winery connected to Charles Krug? Robert Mondavi learned winemaking at Charles Krug, which his family had owned since 1943, before a dispute with his brother Peter led him to leave and found his own winery in Oakville in 1966.

How many days do you need for a Napa Valley trip? We built a five-day itinerary covering downtown Napa, the Napa Valley Wine Train, Oakville, and Rutherford. The full stop-by-stop plan, including reservation tips, is available to The House’s paid Substack subscribers.

What’s the best time of year to visit Napa Valley? Late May through early June, just after the Bottle Rock festival, tends to run quieter than peak summer and fall, with more flexibility for same-day reservations.

Credits:

Writing and photography by Kacey Perez | @the.house.studios