08/28/2026
History of the Rava Wines property: Where Wine Country, the World of Music and Horse Country Merge
Long before Paso Robles became synonymous with wine, it was something else entirely — a quiet intersection of secret artist escapes and working horse ranches. Rava Wines, purchased in 2010, sits on what was once Creston Oaks Arabian Ranch, a long-forgotten working Arabian horse ranch. The property was once named one of the top destinations on the Central Coast alongside Morro Rock by Sunset magazine (see next post for some local history) — a nod to an era before the vineyards took over.
That equestrian and artistic history runs deeper than one ranch. Around the corner Kenny Rogers’ longtime music manager, Ken Kragen — the man behind “We Are the World” and the architect of Rogers’ and Lionel Richie’s careers — bought a 751-acre estate in Paso Robles wine country in the 1990s called Eagle Oak Ranch. He and his wife built a villa there as a private Hollywood retreat, hosting superstar clients including Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie, and Dolly Parton. Local lore holds that Parton and Rogers would hike up to the ranch’s Lookout Point at sunset to sing together privately, their voices carrying across the hills — no audience, no cameras, just two legends and the landscape. Kenny kept his horse at the Rava Wines property (pictured with the original owner, picture curtsey of Creston Oaks Ranch)
Three miles to the east another property carries their own piece of Central Coast legacy: Alex Trebek owned until the 2000s, part of the same layered history of horse racing, music, and wine that shaped this stretch of California before it became known as wine country. That estate recently sold at auction for $16.9 million.
Three different worlds — music, wine, and horses — all converging on the same hills.
