Border Odyssey:

An Exploration of WA & OR Wines

Washington and Oregon. Geez, were there ever two states that seemed more like-minded? Both states can be summed up pretty easily.

Draw a line down the divide of the Cascade Mountains, and you’ve got wet lushness on the west side, and dry high desert on the east. All the big cities on the West side, and a whole lot of nothing on the east. Politically, it’s blue on the left (conveniently), and red on the right (unfortunately). So much we have in common! Are the only differences that they don’t have sales tax in Oregon and you can’t pump your own gas? It wasn’t until we began studying wine that a deeper contrast came into focus, and it has to do with how the two states were founded. These differences profoundly affect how wine is made in each state, (with exceptions galore.) We will explore…

Not too long ago, a covered wagon train reached the terminus of the Oregon Trail. There, amidst the cool breezes, and lush, fertile landscape surrounded by distant volcanoes on clear days, or perhaps more commonly, a thick layer of moisture hanging in the air, a farmer or two thought, “This valley sure does look like Bourgogne* - We should probably get us some Pinot”. The fact that Oregon was initially settled by collective farmers was indeed auspicious. These early pioneers decided to work together to make the best use of the land they settled, and it’s in this spirit that the Willamette Valley generally remains a bastion of organic and biodynamic farmland today, integrating agriculture as part of the natural environment. While delicate, finicky, nuanced Pinot Noir reigns supreme, Oregon is one of the most dynamic wine regions in the country. Some consider the wine scene there today entering a new renaissance. These wines on the whole are more delicate, nuanced, higher acid, and lower alcohol - conducive to the natural wine profile we outlined in our last release.

Meanwhile next door...

A more competitive ethos arrived in Washington when the Denny Party landed on Alki Beach. Alas, the Evergreen State was founded by industrialists eager to pillage the earth of its natural resources (think gold rush, timber, or that guy in the 1960’s who kidnapped baby orca and shipped them to marine parks around the globe. But we digress…). On the whole, Washington embodies a fiduciary-friendly worldview that translates directly to the modern wine industry mostly consisting of large farming operations in a desert. There’s a reason the richest people in the world live in Washington: It’s a corporate tax haven!

Washington is the second largest producer of wine in the US (after California which represents about 80% of the US wine industry) and 60% of that WA wine industry is owned entirely by Chateau St. Michelle, which in turn was recently sold by its owner Phillip Morris (the tobacco megagiant) to a private equity firm. Pretty gross, right? Further, a vast number of Washington wineries steer clear of what we would consider natural or low intervention wine-making, taking preference to more conventional practices: inoculated yeast, sulfites, fining, filtering, chemical additions, you name it. Due to the high desert continental climate, grapes tend to get very ripe, yielding wine that is fruit forward, lower acid, hella boozy and generally more monolithic. And yet, Washington wine still finds ways to surprise. There are many stand out producers, and even natty ones in the mix.

 There are some similarities in both state’s wine histories, as well. The 1820’s saw our friend - vitis vinifera, the European grapevine planted in Willamette and Yakima valleys, respectively. By the turn of the 20th century, both states began holding fairs celebrating their viticultural achievements. Then the phylloxera epidemic arrived in the PNW which continues to affect places like the Willamette Valley. Washington is lucky that its production area is predominantly sandy soil which the vine-root-eating phylloxera louse doesn’t care for. Prohibition slowed things significantly, but a renewed interest in the 1960’s saw both state’s wine industries begin to take off into the stratosphere.

House Missoula: Fire & Flood

One cannot simply speak to the wonders of PNW wines without mentioning the Missoula Floods. Fourteen-ish million years ago what is now Washington was more or less sliding over the Yellowstone hotspot responsible for layers upon layers of volcanic rock formations, mostly crystallized basalt. Additionally, due to volcanic eruptions, the area was blanketed in volcanic ash from time to time. The Yellowstone volcano, by the way, is thought to erupt every 600,000 years and the last time Yellowstone erupted was 640,000 years ago - we are overdue.

Jaunting forward abit 10,000 years when the Cordilleran Ice Sheet covered much of Canada and the Northern bits of the US. During the Ice Age, glaciers would block water channels, creating temporary dams. Imagine the glory of Lake Missoula, 10 times the volume of the present day Great Lakes. Eventually, the buoyancy of the ice caused the glacier to float, dislodging the ice dam, and releasing all the water at once to catastrophic effect. It's estimated that the water released by the Missoula Floods would have been great enough to cover the entire Columbia Valley in a wave of water a hundred feet deep, traveling at 60 miles per hour. The deluge tore across central Washington, crashed into the Cascade Mountains,  expanded the water channel that we now know as the Columbia River  and through the Wallula Gap, flooded with a whoosh into the Willamette Valley and eventually drained into the Pacific Ocean. The enormous floods left behind massive destruction in its wake, churning up soil, bludgeoning boulders, and cutting deep channels into the landscape. Geologic studies of soil layers in the Missoula Valley suggest that this may have happened as many as 30 times during a 6,000 year period, perhaps more. You thought climate change was bad now? 

But, these massive floods also deposited copious amounts of minerals and glacial soils that added a complex diversity to the landscape beyond the desert scrub. The floods endowed eastern Washington and parts of Oregon with a unique terroir unlike anywhere in the world where both a high desert continental climate, mineral diversity, and an abundance of water for irrigation thanks to the unstoppable Columbia River have created a mammoth of New World viticulture we know and love. The Willamette Valley, much like Bourgogne, is a mosaic of soils at various elevations. Ancient volcanic Jory soil, uplifted and subsequently eroded into rolling hills. The sedimentary Willakenzie soils, littered with marine fossils, are layered around these hills and on the valley floor with additional sediment deposited by the flood wave of destruction. The valley, which extends more than 100 miles south of present day Portland, is moderated by the winding Willamette River. The Coastal range to the west provides some protection from the Northern Pacific weather, but cool air is funneled into the valley through a gap in the range known as the Van Duzer Corridor. All of these natural factors contribute to near perfect growing conditions, particularly for fussy pinot noir. 

Basically, the PNW has many advantages for launching a viticultural revolution. We’re coming for you, California. 

We have travelled extensively throughout Oregon and Washington production areas. If you’re headed out on a wine roadtrip of your own, hit us up for our favorite spots from Willamette to Woodinville to Walla Walla.

There are an overwhelming number of wineries and planning a tasting itineray can be tricky. We’re here to help.