This is a belated posting of my notes on a tour of a few vinyards in the
Willamette Valley.

No detailed tasting notes will be posted. Only my impressions of the
various Wineries.

Those not familiar with the Willamette Valley should note that this was our
personal choice of Wineries. There are somewhere around a hundred wineries
in the area, and these are in no way represented to be anything but a
somewhat random selection.

My daughter and my new son-in-law gave my wife and me a night at Wine
Country Farm B&B near Dayton for October 28 as a thank you present for our
help with their wedding.

Since we are around four hours from there, we decided to get a room in
Portland Friday, giving us a more unhurried trip.

Saturday Morning, after spending an hour or two at Powell's (a Portland
institution of a bookstore), we started winetasting our way to the B&B.

Our first stop was Ponzi, and the winery didn't leave a mark, positive or
negative on my memory.

I think the next was Cooper Mountain. I believe that's the winery where
the pourer demonstrated how the same grape, the same year, handled by the
same wine makers could vary depending on the vinyard the grapes grew in.
We were impressed enough to buy several of the Pinot Noirs.

Next came Oak Knoll. Two things stood out there. One was the American
Grapes (Vitis labrusca) that they have made quite good wine from.

The wine made from Niagara Grapes (white) "Grape Eruption" we thought the
better, and that's what we bought. Aroma of Currants, and the minor, but
definite note of the sharp scent you'd get if you bit into a grape vine.
The taste was simple, resembling a white grape juice. Overall very good,
but not really a food wine.

The second thing of note was there second Pinot Noir, Arcachon, which they
declared not good enough to put their name on. Maybe not, but at $5 a
bottle, it was definitely the buy of our trip. We liked the other Pinot
Noirs, and a Chardonet, etc. well enough to buy, but filled out the case
wih 5 or 6 bottles of Arcachon.

We headed toward our B&B, and on the way stopped for a belated lunch.

After check in we went to a few nearby wineries for tastings (and could
have gone to a half dozen others, we picked up a few whites at Erath
Vinyards.

We returned to Wine Country Farms, they were conducting a tasting, we
enjoyed most of their offerings, especially their cider, and their Muller
Thurgau, but also bought their semi-sweet Reisling.

And then to bed.

Notes on Wine Country Farms B&B, we liked it. YMMV. We stayed at one of
the rooms in the house. I understand there are also detached cottages.
The informal feeling of the main house might be off-putting, or might be
just to your taste.

The next day after a very good breakfast at the B&B, we set out for some
more tasting before heading home.

Note to others: Check when the tasting rooms open before setting out! We
didn't go to one of the wineries on the list because I didn't notice the 1
PM opening. If I had, I could have reversed the loop, and caught it.

We headed south, most of the wines have "Salem" as the city of bottling,
though I'd describe the region as around Amity.

The first winery that Sunday was Coelho, in downtown Amity. The most
memorable was a port style Pinot Noir, athough we picked up some regular
Pinot Noir too.

Then to Amity Cellars. Considering the genesis of our trip, we couldn't
resist picking up a couple bottles of Wedding Dance Reisling. We also
liked a couple of the Pinot Noirs we tasted. I don't remember the details
of what they tasted like, but I do remember tasting one Pinot, mmm, very
nice, another, very nice, and then their 2000 Wine Makers Reserve, Wow!. I
bought a bottle at $40. I also took a chance on their 1985 Willamette
Valley Pinot Noir for $75. That wasn't one of the wines on the tasting,
and we haven't opened it yet, so my fingers are still crossed.

After Amity weheaded Bethel Heights, Cristom, and Witness Tree. The
details mostly blur, but I remember that at Cristom, they had already sold
out of their Viognier, but Witness Tree had some we liked well enough to
buy.

After that we were pretty much wineried out, and headed to McMinnville,
where we had an early dinner at Bistro Maison. To keep it on topic,
although we were not in the mood for wine, the prices on the win list
seemed reasonable by US Restaurant standards.

We found that we liked Pinot Noir much more than we had thought, we plan to
compare Oregon Pinots with California, and see if it's just Oregon. My
wife has found only one Pinot Grigio that she liked, until Oregon, most of
the Oregon ones were good. We have not been Chardonnay fans, neither of
the oakier, what I think of as California style, or the unoaked steely but
the Oregon Chardonnays were quite good. We just finished a bottle of Oak
Knoll, ironically labeled "Unoaked Chardonnay", and quite enjoyed it.

thanks for the notes.
I especially like the idea that Cooper Mountain was willing to
demonstrate the difference terroir could make. Never heard of winery,
but sounds like they made a effort to be a learning experience, which
is a definite plus.

> We found that we liked Pinot Noir much more than we had thought, we plan to
> compare Oregon Pinots with California, and see if it's just Oregon. My
> wife has found only one Pinot Grigio that she liked, until Oregon, most of
> the Oregon ones were good. We have not been Chardonnay fans, neither of
> the oakier, what I think of as California style, or the unoaked steely but
> the Oregon Chardonnays were quite good. We just finished a bottle of Oak
> Knoll, ironically labeled "Unoaked Chardonnay", and quite enjoyed it.

It's not ironic. Just not many wineries produce an unoaked Chardonnay.
It's named that because the Chardonnay isn't aged in oak (but just
steel vessels and then bottled, in case you didn't know).

Want to really compare something? Why not Oregon wines with Oregon
wines? Forget California.

David

DaleW wrote:
> thanks for the notes.
> I especially like the idea that Cooper Mountain was willing to
> demonstrate the difference terroir could make. Never heard of winery,
> but sounds like they made a effort to be a learning experience, which
> is a definite plus.

Cooper Mountain is a smaller, but up-and-coming winery known for their
range of organic wines. They also happen to be 2 miles from my house.
One of the benefits of living on Cooper Mountain (the mountain, not the
winery). You'd think they could have a more original name. Then again,
I *could* opt to name my organic hops crop as "Cooper Mountain Hops"
next year.

David