Oregon Wines

We left Kool April Nites in Redding, CA on Friday and drove about 200 miles north on Interstate 5 stopping in Myrtle Creek, OR.  This is between Medford and Roseburg.  I had scoped out a nice campground about 2 miles off the interstate, Tri-City RV Park.  The description and satellite picture proved to be correct.  It is a small park that is nicely maintained with level concrete spaces and grass in between sites.  The best part is the 360 degree view you have.  Here are a couple of pictures of our views.

The downside is the rain.  I am writing this on Sunday morning and it has just stopped raining for the first time since we got here.  It does make the place very green!

On Saturday we went exploring.  This area is a wine region for Oregon (Umpqua Valley).  It is home to about 20 or so boutique wineries.  They each produce around 1000 cases per year and sell locally or just at the winery.  Seems that the best wines in this area are Pinot Noirs and Syrah’s with some dry white wines that are also very good.  Here is the wine tour map for the area.

We started north near Sutherlin with the Reustle Prayer Rock winery.  From all the wineries we have visited this one ranks at the top of the list.  The winery itself is beautiful and then for the tasting you go into their cave and sit in a small alcove where you are presented 5 wines with paired appetizers.  It was a great experience.

From there we visited 3 other wineries nearby and then called it a day as the rain had started to come quite hard and we were competing with a wine tour event for the area that had 5 bus loads of people visiting the wineries in the valley.  Also, they pour generously at each winery so 4 was enough.   Since these are small wineries you are meeting the owners, who are the winemakers, at each stop and they were all very nice and enjoyable to talk to.