My story on the Columbia Gorge's buzzing wine scene is in the July/Aug. issue of Condé Nast Traveler. For now, it's not available online. But here's the unedited version with a few behind-the-scenes photos from various recent reporting trips.
It’s a beautiful evening when my husband and I arrive at Buona Notte, a winery in Cascade Locks, Oregon, for a late spring feast. After winemaker Graham Markel, 40, greets us with a pour of his pet nat, we wander over to a table piled with melon and prosciutto. Candlelit tables festooned with wildflowers are soon filled with platters of green salad, grilled potatoes with salsa verde, and roasted pork. Soon we're chatting with Chase Silcocks, a winemaker at Little Bastions and grape grower Jason Mann. The dinner was to celebrate the seven farmers Markel sources grapes from—and without whom he would not be able to make his delicious Italian-style wines like Sangiovese, Pinot Grigio, and a rustic rosé made of Sangiovese and Dolcetto.
Markel is part of a new wave of wine and cider makers shaping the Columbia Gorge wine scene. On previous trips, I’ve visited established wineries like Analemma, Hiyu Wine Farm, and Savage Grace; this time I wanted to check out the more recent buzzy transplants I’d been hearing about. Next door to Markel are Malia Myers and Melaney Schmidt, the power couple that bootstrapped Landmass Wines, where they focus on sparkling wines. Markel shares space with Jasper Smith and Ella McCallion of Son of Man, who make wild-fermented Basque-style ciders that rival any you’ll find in Spain.
But its exciting beverage scene is only one appeal of the Gorge, an hour’s drive from our Portland home. A spectacular part of our country, the Gorge was formed by ancient volcanoes and glacial floods. For 309 miles, the Columbia River—which starts in British Columbia and empties into the Pacific Ocean at Astoria—divides Oregon and Washington. This official “scenic area”—a designation that receives federal protection—goes from Troutdale in the West and stretches 83 miles to the Deschutes River in the East. The river canyon contains dramatic basalt cliffs, waterfalls, and oodles of hiking trails. While Hood River on the Oregon side has traditionally attracted all the attention—full of craft breweries, restaurants, and a lovely waterfront—it is also the “wind-surfing capital of the world,” after all. I wanted to stay just across the river in the town of White Salmon, Washington (population: 2500). Perched high above the river, White Salmon not only has the best bakery in the Gorge and a new Slovenian wine bar, but on clear days you can see Mount Hood from anywhere in town.
The hotel scene on the Washington side has kept pace with the area's winery openings—with accommodations for all income levels. You can go glamping at Skamania Lodge in Stevenson, Washington ($600/ night); stay in the chic bunk rooms at the Society Hotel in Bingen ($45/night), which has a spa and cozy library; or overnight at the Lyle Hotel, a 1905 property with tastefully redone rooms. But on our most recent trip, we checked ourselves into the new Hotel Iconica, a 30-unit property owned by former extreme kayaker Tao Berman. It was hard to pry ourselves away from our suite because of its unimpeded view of Mount Hood. But for most of the week, our base was the Inn of the White Salmon. New owners Flo and Nicole Niemesch have updated the 22 rooms—many of which also have mountain views—and tend the garden patio, teeming with crocosmia and lilies. Flo, who hails from Heidelberg, was often at the front desk, and offered us great tips on local restaurants and shaded hikes.
Facing 103-degree heat, we woke early to hit the trails. One morning, we drove to Catherine Creek, 8 miles east of White Salmon. Known for its riot of color during spring wildflower season, Catherine Creek is a 2- mile loop with a 200-foot elevation gain and rousing views of the Gorge—Mount Hood sparkling in the distance. The next morning, we followed a winemaker’s tip and headed to Buck Creek, west of White Salmon. Past an ecovillage called the Atlan Center, the path is sheltered by tall trees—nature’s air-conditioner. After our morning hikes, we inevitably made a beeline for the White Salmon Baking Co. and its menu of delightful goodies—from blueberry polenta cake to mushroom scrambles.
One day, I made the short trek to Underwood Mountain, a high elevation site in Washington. At Loop de Loop, Julia Bailey Gulstine specializes in low-intervention wines made in an Old World style. A former aid worker in the Middle East, Gulstine got the wine bug when a Palestinian winemaker friend dropped off a bunch of grapes on her doorstep. “I bought kiddy pools to macerate the grapes and used a sheet to press and strain the juice,” she tells me. “It actually turned out pretty good.” Back in Oregon in 2012, she started making wine at colleagues’ cellars and then at a wine collective in Portland; she and her husband, Scott, bought this vineyard in 2019. We talked about her peripatetic career path—a “loop de loop” of epic proportions—and wandered into the nearby forest where Gulstine showed me the remains of a wild phantom orchid, a sign that the volcanic soil here is healthy. Maybe it was the scenery or maybe it was the magical wines—I tasted a balanced Chardonnay, a skin-contact Pinot Gris, and a lively Pinot Noir. I was transported.
An appreciation for good food runs deep in the Gorge’s lively beverage scene and the cidery Son of Man is no exception. Reserve a spot at one of their seasonal dinner parties. In April, owners Smith and McCallion open up their cidery for Txotx, a traditional Basque festival of cider where they serve cider straight from the tanks alongside grilled whole fish and steaks. In the past, Portland chefs have helmed Son of Man’s annual Summer Party. This year Smith himself will be manning the grill, making 32 oz ribeyes and grilled trout. Come November, the couple throws a Harvest Dinner with a killer family-style meal.
Dining options in White Salmon have ballooned in recent years. There’s Pixan, a taqueria with excellent carnitas tacos; a chic cocktail bar, Gander & Goose; and Soča, the Slovenian wine bar co-founded by Jure Poberaj and Nina Jimenez. One night we dined at Henni’s, where I ordered a mouth-watering steak with crispy potatoes and a red chili aioli, followed by Malva Pudding, a South African treat reminiscent of sticky toffee pudding. (The owner is from South Africa.) But one of my favorite dishes all week is at Soča: burrata with mint pesto, studded with crispy prosciutto and locally-grown snap peas. Now-owner Bethany Kimmel, also a winemaker—she makes gamay under the label Color Collector—has kept the far-flung bottle selections and by-the-glass pours.
Jimenez and Poberaj, who is from Slovenia, have put their mark on White Salmon’s food scene. They opened the White Salmon Baking Co. in 2015 but sold it to one of their employees last summer to focus on their new winery, Poberaj Wines. To reach their 10-acre property, also their home, I drove high up in the hills of rural White Salmon and down a dirt road. Poberaj, the nephew of natural winemaking pioneer Joško Gravner, grew interested in wine when he started mingling with Gorge area winemakers at the bakery’s Monday pizza nights and they’d bring bottles to share.
Poberaj, who started making wine in 2018 at Hiyu, showed me the room where he just buried nine clay amphora and then we wander into his subterranean cellar to taste his wines directly from barrel. There’s character to this wine, made from organic Gorge-grown grapes. (The couple have planted a 3-acre vineyard with Nebiollo, Ribolla Gialla, and Fruliano—but only the Fruliano is producing fruit.) Sitting on their back deck, which naturally has a view of majestic Mount Hood, I ask if he’ll be doing tastings here at the house. Poberaj surprises me by saying yes—by appointment only, starting this fall. I can think of no better way to spend an afternoon: sipping a glass of Friulano and snacking on cheese and charcuterie while talking about the Gorge and Slovenia.
There’s a certain renegade quality to many of these winemakers. “We’re very serious about having fun,” says Malia Myers at Landmass. As she and Schmidt show me around their barrel room, I see what she means: Barrels are named after spirited female characters from TV and music—Angelica (from Rugrats), Regina (from Mean Girls), Oksana (the assassin from Killing Eve). Their first wine was named Jolene, after Dolly Parton's song. Schmidt comes from a working class background. “I thought wine was for fancy people,” she told me. But when she was a bartender in L.A., she began buying wines from Illahe in Oregon’s Willamette Valley. Myers and Schmidt eventually moved to Oregon to learn winemaking at Illahe. The couple launched Landmass in 2018 in the Willamette Valley but moved to the Gorge, after Schmidt returned from working a harvest in Tasmania. They have no investors and built their business on Instagram, doing door-to-door delivery to customers during the pandemic. “Every dollar we make we put back into making better wine,” Melaney tells me.