Travel Guide: 24 Hours In Willamette Valley, Oregon

We recently spent a long weekend in Oregon that we will be chronicling on the blog because it was so beautiful, fun and had so much diversity in terms of ways to explore the state. We started our adventure in Willamette Valley, which is about two hours from Portland and is their answer to Napa Valley. During the trip, we stayed at Youngberg Hill Inn, which I cannot recommend highly enough. We wrote about it in a post here.

We only had one full day and night to explore Willamette before heading to Portland, so we wanted to make the best use of our time. After lots of research, we found all of the best wineries to visit and the best place for dinner. Read on below for our Willamette Valley Travel Guide.

Willamette's Youngberg Hill
We fell in love with the pinots at Youngberg Hill

Youngberg Hill

Start your day at Youngberg Hill, which we were lucky enough to stay at. As we wrote about in a post about our stay there, it has the most beautiful views of the valley and is such a nice way to start the day. If you are staying at the inn, a tasting is included in your room. So, after breakfast, head outside to their enormous wraparound porch and enjoy some earthy pinots on the terrace while taking in the view. If you aren’t staying there, the tasting room opens at 10 a.m. and is a good kickoff for a day of tastings. We particularly loved their Jordan pinot noir, but were also big fans of their Chardonnays.

Willamette Valley In 24 Hours
The most amazing dry rose at Willakenzie in Willamette Valley.

Willakenzie

Our next stop was the beautiful Willakenzie Estate. This vineyard was visually stunning, with rolling hills of grape vines mixes in with Oregon’s iconic green pine trees. We were greeted at the tasting room with a glass of their rose, which I was initially skeptical about. I’ve pretty much only enjoyed roses from France, but Willakenzie’s rose was delicious and dry. They just recently started making rose and are committed to it, taking a different approach than other wineries that are using run-off red wine to make their rose. They describe their rose as “very intentional” and it shows once you have a sip.

Glass of rose in hand, we walked around Willzkenzie’s grounds and learned more about the wine production. The vineyard’s history dates back 25 years ago and is very well known for its pinots. We sampled a number of just delicious wines here, but our favorite was the triple black slopes Pinot Noir. This is made in small quantities and typically is only consumed by members of their wine club. The club is worth joining for access to this bottle, in our opinion. We also loved their Aliette Pinot Noir and Terre Bases Pinot Noir, but really everything we tried was great and complex.

Willamette Valley In 24 Hours
A delicious gourmet lunch spread on the terrace at Willakenzie.

We also had the most delicious spread of gourmet sandwiches, salads cheese and nibbles on the terrace at Willakenzie overlooking their vineyard which was so delightful in every way. Definitely worth a visit!

Gran Moraine

After Willakenzie, we visited its sister winery just a few minutes drive down the road, called Gran Moraine. Visually, the vineyard is less breathtaking than the others we visited during the day, but their wines were very good.

Their winemaker has a good sense of humor, and we particularly liked how he gave interesting wine notes on the bottle such as “winter evening.”

Willamette Valley Travel Guide
Stoller Estate has a family picnic kind of vibe paired with amazing wines.

Stoller Family Estate

Next, we headed to Stoller Family Estate and instantly fell in love with their tasting room. The design details here are really special. Once you walk into the tasting room, you immediately see their bright green vineyards straight ahead because the entire back wall of the tasting room is floor-to-ceiling glass.

Next, we set up for our tasting not heir patio overlooking their vineyard. The grounds have a glamour family picnic vibe to it. There are white adirondack chairs around the grounds, which were such a nice way to have a glass of wine. They also have a beautiful tree with a tire swing on it further off that becomes part of the focal point when you are tasting outside. We brought a glass of wine with us out to the swings and had entirely too much fun on them.

We tried a number of varieties at Stoller, including their chardonnay, pinto blanc and pinot noir. We also had the privilege of trying some wines from their legacy collection. We particularly enjoyed the Helen.

We appreciated that Stoller is very committed to sustainability and it even has a LEED Gold certification and they are very committed to taking care of their agricultural workers, which is an added reason to support them. Would definitely recommend a tasting at Stoller and packing a picnic to enjoy their grounds.

Willamette Travel Guide
The beef wellington at Joel Palmer House in Willamette Valley, Oregon is one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.

Dinner at Joel Palmer House

End your day of wine tasting by treating yourself to a delicious meal at Joel Palmer House with MORE wine. Joel Palmer is an institution in Willamette, and is known for perfectly executed creative dishes. One of the stars of the show at Joel Palmer is mushrooms, which the executive chef incorporates into a lot of dishes in truly delicious ways. Their is even a mushroom tasting menu you can do if you so please. But, if you don’t want all mushrooms, you can still get tastes of it on the menu.

We each started with a glass of Pinot Noir, because Oregon, and the three-mushroom tart to share. The tart comes out looking like a piece of pie and it is truly decadent and rich and really hits the spot. The puff pastry is perfectly buttery and the mushrooms were some of the best I’ve tried. We couldn’t eat at Joel Palmer and not get some sort of mushroom dish, right?

Willamette Valley Travel Guide
Delicious duck at Joel Palmer House

For our mains, we split the duck breast with Chinese five-spice, apple and foie gras and the beef wellington (more mushrooms in the mushroom duxelles!) which also had foie gras. Both presentations were beautiful and the portions were quite large, making them great for sharing. But, the best part was how tasty each bit we tried was. I was truly in a food coma by the end of this meal even though I typically do not finish my food.

I was ready to raise the white flag at this point, but my fiancé had eyed the dessert menu and it was pretty impressive from the get go. There is an “Into The Woods” dessert tasting that is incredible, with bites of creme burls and tarts and other desserts.

We will definitely be coming back to Joel Palmer on future trips to Willamette and hope to try their three-course tasting menu which is very reasonably priced at $59.

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