Jamie Knee | Top Luxury Wine Travel Writer Shares Her Best 2026 Wine Destinations

Spain: Rioja and the Basque Country

I return to Rioja not just as a traveler, but as a Certified Rioja Wine Educator and Spanish Wine Scholar. In winter and early spring, Rioja’s vineyards rest and reveal their intellectual soul, the perfect backdrop for deeper conversations about terroir, tradition, and the quiet confidence of a wine region that has never needed to raise its voice.

From Rioja’s ancient hill towns to the vibrant food culture of the Basque Country, where Txakoli glimmers by the sea and pintxos tell their own stories plate by plate, these regions offer a sensory map of history, flavor, and place that I find endlessly compelling. If you love Spanish wine travel as much as I do, begin with my Rioja Wine Region Guide.

Paris in Spring: A Wine Lover’s Home Base

Springtime in Paris is a quiet luxury I return to year after year. From here, the great wine regions of France feel beautifully within reach — Champagne, the Loire Valley, Burgundy, and Alsace radiate outward by train, each one a day trip that returns you to the city by evening with shoes dusty from vineyards and a carefully wrapped bottle in hand. Paris does not compete with its wine regions. It simply makes arriving home feel like part of the journey.

Krakow and Emerging European Wine in Poland

In March, I will be speaking at a wine travel conference in Krakow at a remarkable moment — Poland is quietly defining itself as an emerging European wine region and the conversation happening there right now is one worth following. Crisp white varieties are gaining momentum, experimental plantings of hardy hybrids are finding their footing, and classic grapes like Pinot Noir are discovering fresh interpretations in Polish soils. This is wine travel at its most alive, the kind that rewards those who arrive before the crowds do. I will be presenting my Wine as a Passport talk at IWINETC and sharing everything I discover here.

Judging, Listening, and the Wines of the West Coast

Back on the American side of the globe, I will continue serving as a wine competition judge across Northern California, Sonoma, the Central Coast, Southern California, and select international venues. There is something profoundly grounding about spending focused hours in a judging room, moving through dozens of glasses with quiet attention and no agenda beyond the wine itself. This year offers return visits to Sonoma’s fog-softened Pinot Noirs, the luminous hills and Rhone-style blends of Paso Robles, the cool climate elegance of Santa Barbara, and the bold yet refined Cabernets of Napa. You can find my full wine judging profile here.

Italy, Always Italy and the Mediterranean

Italy remains a perennial source of inspiration and 2026 will bring extended visits to Tuscany, Piemonte, Corsica, Sicily, Campania, Malta, and beyond. If you love Italian wine travel, my Montefalco Wine Travel Guide is a beautiful place to begin. Wine in Italy is always a conversation between soil and soul, tradition and innovation, the ancient and the effortlessly alive.

I am especially excited to return to Roero, where I will be speaking about the region’s wines — Roero Arneis and Roero Rosso — and hosting Italian wine dinners dedicated to its singular terroir. Roero is a place that rewards curiosity and deserves its own chapter in any well-curated wine travel story. Watch me present the Wines of Roero on Instagram and join me there in spirit.

Festivals, Panels and Conversations

In 2026, I also look forward to the dialogues that happen off the tasting room floor — at festivals, on panels, and in the rooms where wine culture is shaped and shared with the world. I will be moderating at Fest Forums, where wine, storytelling, and experience converge in ways that remind me why I fell in love with this work in the first place. Watch my Fest Forums presentation on Instagram and see what that conversation looks like in practice.

What to Expect from Petite Wine Traveler in 2026

This year you can expect transportive luxury wine travel stories from both emerging and established wine regions, slow sensory narratives that emphasize depth over spectacle, soulful stays rooted in local culture, thoughtful food and wine pairings anchored in place, and intimate conversations with the winemakers, chefs, growers, and cultural custodians who make a destination worth traveling for. Some weeks I will wander to distant corners of the wine world. Other weeks we may simply set a beautiful table, open a meaningful bottle, and let imagination do the traveling.

Work With Me in 2026

If you are a tourism board, luxury hotel or resort, cruise line, wine region, or PR agency looking for an authoritative editorial voice in luxury wine travel and enotourism, I am available worldwide for speaking engagements, media partnerships, press trips, wine residencies, hosted experiences, and brand collaborations. My work spans print, broadcast, digital, and live events — and every engagement is built on the same philosophy that has guided Petite Wine Traveler from the beginning: wine as a passport to place, culture, and human connection.

Contact Jamie Knee