Rosie and The Operator are visiting McMinnville, Oregon for a couple of days in the heart of the Williamette Valley Oregon Wine Country and the bonus, its only a one-hour drive from Portland!
We have loved our stay in Portland but are leaving the city behind in our rear-view mirror. It does not take long before we are off the Interstate and driving down narrow roads of rolling Oregon farmland, past orchards and wineries in the fog shrouded early morning.
The journey was scenic and the houses looked idyllic set back in their paddocks with huge trees that dot the landscape adding to the storybook setting rolling out before us.
This area has over 200 small batch vineyards and wineries making it the highest concentration of wine growers in Oregon. Parked up overlooking one of the vineyards, some kids are playing, laughing and screaming on a tyre swing tied to one of the giant trees.
Huge silos and barns sit close to the houses, the vines that run up the hillsides to meet them are already harvested and the last of the autumn leaves are brown and few and far between clinging to the branches.
Driving into McMinnville, dubbed Oregon’s Favourite Main Street and wandering around, the main street is quiet and almost deserted for a town of 33,000. The footpath signs are out in front of the open shops but there are not many people about. Those few that are out strolling are in no hurry as they slowly take in the sights and snap photos, just like us.
The town was founded in 1843 and is elegant and quirky. Ben Franklin, Americas founding father sits on a seat in the middle of Main Street holding a relaxed pose with a quizzical look on his face and a twinkle in his eye. He seems to enjoy the fact that the town is like taking a step back in time, to slower paced days that he seems to remember so well.
Beautiful old neon signage and an old fashioned vibe totally add to this feeling of nostalgia as does the haberdashery material store specialising in quilting materials. These stores are normally obsolete now from high streets but is standing the test of time here in McMinnville.
A second hand appliance store sits next to art galleries and there are plenty of antique stores with some quirky artistic flourishes. Rosie loves the ‘people’ that have been made from these items of old electrical equipment.
The local art shop is the best Rosie has seen anywhere, ever. It is an artist’s paradise for materials of all genres, if you didn’t paint when you went in…you would want to by the time you walked out. Rosie is kind of glad this shop is nowhere where she lives…Rosie knows she would spend a fortune on art supplies she probably would never use. Gotta love the T Shirt though.
In between wine tastings, whilst walking the streets of McMinnville Rosie noticed this huge billboard on the side of a building. Rosie stopped and looked at it. Frowned, and said to The Operator she doesn’t get it. Get what? said The Operator. McMinnville or……..what? The Operator stared at Rosie, rolled his eyes and said…McMinnville Or = Oregon. Oh, duh, said Rosie…back to the wine tasting!
Yes, wine tasting stores are aplenty, each representing certain wineries of the district and are cosy places to sip and sample a flight or two of the local tipple. It was great wandering the street, window shopping but the town really came alive at night when the lights wrapped around the trees and their branches twinkled with light and the neon from the old signs illuminated the leaves and blazed over head.
Ben Franklin might have the heads up on the most famous event to have ever happened in McMinville, hence why his statue looks so quizzical . On an early evening in 1950 a couple of farmers out feeding their animals saw a strange metallic disc in the sky hovering above their farm. They rushed inside to get their trusty Kodak and innocuously snapped what was to become arguably the most famous UFO photos of all time. Photos that went worldwide overnight and sparked the greatest debate ever on extra-terrestrial life and UFOs in general. Photos that have also featured on the cover of Time Magazine and still remain unexplained to this day. Que X Files soundtrack.
In honour of this famous UFO sighting, McMinnville hosts a UFO Festival every year that attracts conspiracy theorists, nutters and those wanting to have a crazy, costumed fun time which is apparently a blast. Rosie would love to put this on her calendar!
We are staying at McMenamins Hotel Oregon, built in 1905 and is one of the oldest hotels in town as well as a local landmark that sits right in the middle of Main Street. It is the tallest building in town and is made of towering, solid, squat, red brick. On the inside they have so many rooms it is like a rabbit warren and each room is named after previous owners of the hotel, long standing or notorious staff, famous visitors and famous and infamous locals. It is pretty cool reading about them all and their stories associated with this hotel.
Rosie and The Operator are staying in The Ladies Parlor, a corner room on the 2nd floor where back in the day the ladies would congregate and talk, play cards or knit whilst their men drank in the bars, they were not allowed in, downstairs.
Upstairs, on the rooftop, McMenamins has a dining area overlooking the central town. It is a beautiful hotel that has been fully restored and there are plenty of nooks, crannies, lovely private seating areas and small bars inside to explore whilst you are here.
Rosie was a bit apprehensive though about staying here…this was an old hotel, most of the rooms share a communal bathroom down the hall from your room. Not the most convenient for Rosies multi middle of the night ablutions. But or room, The Ladies Parlor had an ensuite…..of sorts, shared by the adjoining room. Rosie hadn’t told The Operator this piece of news… but on check in Rosie did ask, with fingers crossed, if there was anyone booked into the adjoining room that would be sharing our bathroom. No there wasn’t, yay!!!! Such a relief, now we were really living the high life in this place.
After an inspired and innovative meal of Spanish Tapas that evening at La Rambla, which is located in another of the oldest buildings in town, Rosie wondered what to do now?
The Operator looked at his watch and was horrified to find it was only 7.30pm. Well, looks like we are having a night cap in our lounge bar at the hotel and maybe a board game from their huge collection. Dominos it was. And what an epic battle! Rosie totally annihilated The Operator about 20 games to 3. The Operator in a huff, with his nose in the air declared, ‘some people win at games, others win at life’. Oooooohhhhhh….sore looser much?
Today is Veteran’s Day in the United States and a federal holiday where all the government offices were shut. Starting our day in the local coffee shop it was quite heartening seeing the young locals working in the store and in general on the street observing these veteran’s who were identifiable from the patches they wore on their caps or jackets and thanking them for their service. The stars and stripes were flying along the roadsides and in the small villages when Rosie and The Operator went out for a drive.
The sun had come out in the afternoon and the typical morning fog was long gone. The small towns we passed through had a main street and a few streets of residential houses branching off them. Tractor, chainsaw and feed merchants lined the roadsides coming in and out of these blips on the road and everyone we passed on the road waved to us as we went by.
In Carlton we stopped to have a look at the general store which appeared to be having a roadside sale of some sort, The Operator wasn’t impressed, he thought it looked more like a jumble sale and knew he was now in dangerous territory. No, to his relief, Rosie wasn’t in the market to by lamps or apples but around the front she did pause at a table full of decorative plate boxes.
Some were new, some were second hand and were pretty old and crusty. The handwritten sign taped to the wall behind the table declared that today they were all $2 each. Walking past, one caught Rosie’s eye, she doubled back, The Operator groaned as Rosie dug into the pile of plates and came up with a commemorative moon landing plate from 1969. Rosie tried to google it, she thinks she may be onto a treasure here, dang, there was no internet coverage in this town! So, risking it all for two bucks on finding that piece of buried treasure, and because Rosie did actually like it, she bought it and was back on the road again feeling very smug whilst The Operator shook his head.
Around the Yamhill area the orchard pruners were in full swing nipping off the summer growth and preparing the trees for winter and next season. There are nineteen thousand acres in this part of the state specialising in grapes, walnut, hazelnuts and turkey farming.
The Operator had diligently noted the big mounds of dirt that haphazardly erupted from the ground and sure enough here was an advert, tacked to a power pole on how to get rid of the underground invaders.
The vineyards are mainly all small batch and the landscape around here is rolling and so picturesque at every turn Rosie didn’t know where to look and snap next.
Mt Hood rears its head in the distance and we were lucky to see the mountain today…the landscape and mountain peak remind Rosie so much of home!
On the drive back to McMinnville a field of red spreads out before us, we pull over and take a look as the leaves are just blazing in the afternoon sun and it looks totally magnificent. The field is a nursery of small deciduous trees that are still tenaciously holding onto their autumn coats. What an amazing sight, it just went on and on.
An airplane sits atop the Evergreen Aviation Museum and welcomes you in…nah, sorry folks not today, we left our run to close to closing, Rosie is not crying about missing this, nor is The Operator although this is the home of the famed giant Spruce Goose.
Our time in McMinville has been laid back and relaxed, we have sat and chatted with locals, wandered the streets, sampled so much wine and eaten fantastic farm to plate style seasonal food. We have driven the back roads of the county and taken in the picturesque sites. What a fabulous side trip this has been.
Tomorrow we leave Oregon and move on to a lodge on the edge of Silver Lake in the State of Washington. The blown peak of Mt St Helens looks over the side of the lake and Rosie is looking forward to learning more about this majestic volcano. The Operator, well, he is looking forward to fishing for bass from the deck of our motel room. Serious!
Interested in checking out our stay in Portland?
Portland, Oregon – Keep it Weird
Portland, Oregon – Mississippi & Food Trucks
