A Great Oregon Wine Tour

Our tour guide, the tour and everything about the day truly gets a 5 star from me. The price ($ 150 a person that does not include tasting fees) is the one reason I’d mark this a 4-​star but our experience was so wonderful, I just can’t go there!
We were VERY pleasantly surprised by the tour and our guide, Reagan. She picked us up at my friends apartment in Beaverton as it was on the way to wine country — very accommodating. The van was spacious for myself and my two friends — and very clean. Water bottles were accessible and aplenty– important to stay hydrated whilst indulging in varieties of delicious NW wines. There were also several guides and informative pieces about the area in the van — none of which I looked at because there was too much beautiful scenery — but I imagine it would be helpful to those from out of town.
Reagan was extremely knowledgable of wine, the wine industry and the areas we travelled to. AND hilarious and so much fun for all of us to be around. She was also very willing to let us plan our day, was cognizant of the number of wineries we wanted to visit and the pace of the day. We visited Ardiri (for the scenery and cornhole game), Ponzi (for the wine), and finished at Alloro (for more breath-​taking scenery, delicious wine and a game of bocce ball). Our guide also knew 2 of the 3 wineries personally which made the experience all the more special.
Also included: FOOD. There were dolmas, carrots and hummus, and a cheese, meat and grape plate all of which of course came in handy throughout the day as we drank and munched our way through the North Willamette Valley.
At the end of the day, we were hand-​delivered safely to our respective locations (again, very accommodating as some wanted to go downtown and others wanted to go home in NE).
I would highly recommend this experience to anyone. It was so worth it to have such a safe journey through wine country with such a fun group and entertaining guide. Again, tasting fees aren’t included in this but maybe if you’re lucky they’ll get waived with a bottle purchase or because your tour guide has friends in good places and hooks you up.

My mom and I truly lucked out finding this wine tour, and of course, WAYNE! He is by far one of the most hilarious, open minded, and knowledgable wine connoisseur’s I have ever met. He was able to not only accommodate our wish for a half day tour but also picked us up early from our hotel and took us to the Portland Rose Gardens and Pittock Mansion (which are MUSTS if you are sightseeing!).
Our half day wine tour consisted of 3 stops at various vineyards (one included a wine co-​op with about 10 different wineries from all over Portland). Keep in mind that the wine tasting at each location ranges between $ 10 – 15 per person and is not included in the tour cost. However, most stops did provide bread and cheese which were also an added bonus!
I highly recommend this tour because it was an experience I will truly never forget (and now I am obsessed with Portland Pinor Noirs!).

We had the best tour with Wayne! He offered to pick us up from our hotel, and was on-​time to the minute. Wayne had a great amount of knowledge about the wine region we were in, and was incredibly personable. He asked all of us what type of wines we generally like and did a great job matching us to wineries that were relevant. At the end of the day, he also helped coordinate shipping our wine home for us, which was incredibly helpful! We would highly recommend Wayne if you want a fun day of wine tasting.

Wow! This tour was fabulous! Camille was an absolutely amazing tour guide! She put up with all of our questions and was soooo educational and informative on wines, wine making, wineries, and everything that is Portland and Oregon! Camille made us feel right at home and did not make us feel as if we were too much of a wine novice. She is sooo personable and taught us so much along our tour. The wineries she picked out were just perfect… she knew most of the winemakers which just makes for a more incredible experience for her guests!
Thank you for a fantastic day!

We just had a tour of beautiful Oregon Wine Country. Wayne, the owner, was our guide. He started with «wine is liquid geography» and explained how the difference in climate and soil impacts the wine. I’ve been on many wine tours and I probably learned the most from this one. In addition to being informative, it was a lot of fun. We visited wineries that I would have never discovered on my own.

Wayne was on time, entertaining, educational, and thoughtful. He’s flexible, and will tailor the tour to your likes/​needs if you want, but will also take you off the beaten path to his favorites.
Every winery we walked into with him, he knew a TON about and also had great relationships with all of the winemakers. Many of them gave us tasting discounts or free tastings. Lenne was my favorite– beautiful views and amazing pinot noir (coming from a girl who isn’t even a big pinot fan).
Lastly, the lunch he packed us was AMAZING. Fresh baked banana bread, strawberries, almonds, cheese/​various meats/​crackers, pistachio cookies, mmm. We devoured it.
We had a great time!

I love this place. Why? You won’t find a room full of wine snobs looking down on you for your beginners palate or conservative selections. What you will find is great wine at low prices and a kind staff that is very knowledgeable about a wind variety of wines.
I was Christmas shopping so I stopped by to pick my order and Wayne was away on a Wine Tour, but the ladies working were more than helpful. My sister had sent me an email list of her favorite wines for the holidays. I sent that email over and they were able to pull all of it for me! It worked out really well for «shopping time» because they had everything ready for me when I arrived. They even made some recommendations that turned out to be the best picks.
Thanks again :)

wayne the professional strikes again, with his highly-​informed and well-​written response to my review (as follows):
I just loved these ladies, the thing that stood out the most was the fact they were hung over when we picked them up and had to wait an additional hour while they got «ready»…I don’t mind getting a bad review when I deserve it, but reading what other reviewers say truly is an indication of the stellar wine tours we provide.
this response confuses me for 3 reasons: (1) it doesn’t appear that wayne is attempting to actually refute anything i wrote in my review, so i can only assume his concession on those points; (2) his timekeeping practices are unclear since (as stated in the reviews) he failed to get us to places on-​time, as promised; and (3) how he knew we were allegedly hung over is beyond me, especially since his girlfriend (again, as mentioned in the review) was the one who spent the most time interacting with us while wayne was either on the bus or creeping in some corner.
if anything, wayne’s response to my review is an exclamation point to the assertion that he is an unprofessional business owner.
P. S.: wayne also conveniently forgot to mention that in our tardy, hung over haze, we still managed to tip him quite generously because we recognized that we took up his entire day and that he was kind enough to drop us off at the door.

I reccomend this tour to everyone & anyone!!! I recently booked a tour for my best friends 30^th bday our tour guide, Ryan, was awesome, very down to Earth and just hilarious! He made our day. The two of us (plus Ryan) went to about 7 different wineries and sampled our lil hearts out. My friend and I are not very experienced in wine tasting but our tour guide gave us a lot of information and never once did we feel out of place. I suggest this tour for anyone into drinking some tasty wine in the presence of good company. The price is reasonable & I definitely plan on doing it again.

We had a great time with Wayne! Our group consisted of four girls. We were flexible with the wineries, so Wayne put together a great itinerary for us. He was knowledgeable and a lot of fun. Would definitely recommend using this tour company!

Wayne was so awesome! We had a great time with him on our Oregon wine tour through the Willamette Valley. He picked us up promptly at our hotel and we ventured to 4 different wineries and even a sake brewery. Wayne seems to know all the right people and everyone that we met along the way was very fond of him. At one of the more scenic wineries, we were offered by Wayne a beautiful tray with cheese, fruit, and salami to complement our tasting. We only had to pay one tasting fee ($ 5) as if you talk to the owners and winemakers they are usually willing to wave fees. Wayne was super laid back and friendly which is definitely what we were searching for-​not some up tight guide. Can’t say enough good things about this!

We were a group of about a dozen girls, and we really, really wanted to like Wayne’s tour. However, mistakes and mismanagement of the tour made the experience disappointing and left a sour note on our entire weekend.
First the good parts of Wayne’s tour: (1) He was very responsive when planning the tour with emails and phone calls. (2) He offered to waive the extra pick-​up surcharge as we were coming from a residence in Washington. (3) The wine van was spacious and a perfect size for our group. (4) He will ship wine to you after the tour, which is convenient. (5) The wineries he chose for us to go to were okay (although we wouldn’t necessarily say «spectacular» as advertised.)
And now the bad parts:
(1) Wayne forgot that we wanted a picnic lunch. When finalizing the tour and the price, we had requested Wayne to bring a picnic lunch for us so that we could enjoy it at one of the wineries and as he said «keep the momentum going.» It would have been $ 10 more per person, and it seemed like a good idea. Unfortunately, he forgot the lunch, and when we asked him about it at the 2^nd winery, he immediately claimed that he spoke to one of us the day before and we told him we didn’t want it anymore. None of us had spoken to him the day before, and later on after he had checked his email and his records, he owned up to the mistake.
(2) Now that we didn’t have our picnic lunch, we asked Wayne to take us to a place where we could grab lunch, but he took us to a place where it took us 45 minutes just to wait in line and pick-​up a lunch (not including time to eat it)! Thus, by 3pm that day, we had only been to two wineries, and were just sitting down at a 3^rd winery where we were eating our lunch.
(3) When we had first planned the tour, we told him that the only winery we really, really wanted to go to was Domaine Serene, but that we would trust his expert opinion to choose and manage the rest of the tour (which he gladly agreed to). However, we never made it to Domaine Serene, and some of the girls were very disappointed. When we sat down to lunch at the 3^rd winery, we confirmed with him that we wanted to make sure we have time for Domaine Serene, so maybe we should skip the olive oil tasting he had suggested we do at the next place, and head to Domaine Serene next. His answer: «oh, places are open til 7pm; you guys have lots of wine ahead of you.» At about 3:50pm, one of us happened to go to the Domaine Serene website and discovered that it closed at 4:00pm! We immediately started getting ready to go, and when asked about Domaine Serene’s closing time for tastings, Wayne nonchalantly replied, «Well, they close at 4pm, so you have about 5 minutes.» Needless to say, we got there and the gates were locked.
(3a). It wasn’t until 3 hours later that he apologized to us about messing up going to Domaine Serene. He offered to send a bottle of Domaine Serene to us. It was a nice gesture; however, he apparently «forgot» to send this to us.
(4) Along with the Domaine Serene incident, it became apparent how disorganized and mismanaged our wine tour was. At one of the wineries, he could not be found when we were trying to figure out if we had to pay a tasting fee (he told us before the tour that some would be waived). After we found him, he said that we do need to pay a tasting fee. When we started to pay the winery, the lady told us we didn’t need to pay, since she thought Wayne would «handle it.» Wayne disappeared so we didn’t have an opportunity to check with him; so we just paid the tasting fee.
(5) In general, Wayne seemed cordial and fun, but there were some comments that offended or made the group uncomfortable. One was when he asked about where one of our friends lived in Portland, and he commented that «the Blacks» used to live there but now «they really cleaned it up.» Another uncomfortable topic was when he singled out the only Caucasian girl in our group and said, «so, you’re the only white girl… how’d that happen?»
(6) Winery choices were far from «spectacular» as he claimed. Some of the wine fanatics in the group were very disappointed. The Willamette Valley is best known for their amazing pinot noirs, but none of us felt that we really got to taste great pinots, which was extremely disappointing.
Next time, the wine connoisseurs in our group will just choose the places we will go, make our own reservations, and just hire a driver to take us.

I TOTALLY AGREE WITH DORIS C.‘S REVIEW. I think all the 5 star reviews are his friends (or fake accounts) — Unilocal users beware!
This was by far the WORST wine tour I have been on. I have been on a few in Napa and Sonoma, and this does not even compare. DON’T CALL YOURSELF A TOUR GUIDE, CALL YOURSELF A SHUTTLE BUS DRIVER. Wayne spent no time with us, he was playing with his iPhone the whole time while the people at the winery did all the talking. He really is a glorified shuttle bus driver. He was NOT INFORMATIVE AT ALL, but instead, did a lot of self-​promotion and talked about his wine shop.
Here are the reasons why you SHOULD NOT HIRE HIM (WAYNE) AS YOUR TOUR GUIDE:
1. HE FORGOT OUR LUNCH, and tried to blame my friend that was coordinating. We then proceeded to waste time standing in a line to buy sandwiches, which he did not even offer to buy and we had to buy them ourselves.
2. He did not take us to the requested winery (Domain), due to lack of time management. We got in the shuttle, and he yelled, «we have 5 minutes to get to Domain because they close at 4pm» We did not make it to the requested winery. I think it was also because we wasted about 30 minutes at the sandwich shop. WHY WOULDN’T YOU GO THERE FIRST, IF YOU KNEW THAT WE WANTED TO GO THERE? Isn’t it your job to keep track of the time? Isn’t that what we are paying you for?
3. Tastings ARE NOT INCLUDED in the tour fee.
4. HE WAS RACIST. Here are one of the MANY racist things he has said to us:
WAYNE: Is anyone from Oregon?
My friend: I am.
WAYNE: What part?
My friend: Marina.
WAYNE: Oh, that area is nice. it was the slums where all the blacks used to live, they really cleaned it up… now they moved near Alberta
All of us: …
In conclusion, I wish I could give him ZERO stars, but sadly Unilocal will not allow me to. I hope this review helps, and no one else makes the same mistake. DO NOT HIRE HIM. Might as well rent a van, and ask someone to be a designated driver and go around the wineries. That would have been a much better choice.

Wayne rocked! We had an awesome day in the Williamette Valley. Wayne picked us up at our hotel in Portland and took us to five tastings (we would have hit a sixth but we were having a great time at one of the wineries and that put us a little behind schedule). Wayne was very knowledgable about wine and wine growing. What really stood out for us was how well he was known and how well received we were at the different wineries. Discounts on tastings and definitely some extra attention made it a great experience. The whole experience was one of the most laid back and friendly wine tours we’ve ever done. By the end of the day, Wayne seemed like one of our group. Couldn’t recommend Wayne any higher.

We are in our early thirties and it was our first trip to Portland so we researched Google up and down to compare every wine tour available to us. We’ve done lots of wine tasting around the world and lots of wine tours of all types, so we definitely have opinions on wine tours. After researching online, I narrowed it down and called about 5 places, this being one of them. Although the price was more expensive than some of the other tours, talking to Wayne on the phone I got a great vibe from him and realized he’d be the perfect fit for us and boy was I right!
We booked the day tour but nobody else signed up for that day, so it was the same price for us to get our own private tour. Wayne told us he’d take us wherever we wanted to go. After talking to him about what we were looking for (we are SO over the big commercial, overpriced Napa winery scene but if that’s what you like, he will still take you there), he selected some for us. We had never heard of any of the wineries but we ended up buying wine at almost every one of them, which is rare for us to want to actually buy as much as we did (it means we were impressed with the wine!). He also took us to Sake One which we really loved because we’re starting to get into sake and the prices are great there (highly recommended if you make it up to Portland, BTW).
Wayne is extremely knowledgeable about the wines and the region. He shamelessly wheels and deals/​flirts with all the staff at the wineries which I think is great because he passes the benefits of that onto the customers. One winery we went to was closed for remodeling but he managed to get them to open up just for our tasting! He’s full of energy and so much fun. He also helped me out with some planning of the rest of our trip in Portland before we arrived.
We had such a great time on this trip. I highly recommend at least giving him a call to see if you click. It’s definitely worth paying more for this tour. Worth every penny!

Positives: Not pretentious, friendly guide, smaller vineyards unlikely to be found on other tours.
Negatives: Wayne’s (guide) continuous self promotion, Minimal wine education.
Overall an okay tour, and a great area.

I was so excited to take this tour, but by the end of it, I felt ripped off. You are paying a premium rate but not getting premium service.
Basically you pay $ 150/​person to get picked up and shuttled to about 6 wineries. Don’t expect coverage of tasting fees. Do not expect lunch or fruit/​cheese platters. You may get lucky w/​a free tasting, or a winery may set out hors d’ouevres for special occasions, but do not expect it. These are not pre-​arranged by Wayne and thus not guaranteed. It’s luck of the draw.
Regarding the tour, Wayne has a solid understanding of the region, varietals, the wine-​making process, etc. He spends the outbound trip giving you a background on Oregon wines, but once the tastings begin, he «checks out.» At one of the wineries, he sat apart from the tasting area, chewing on sunflower seeds while we went through our tastings. At another he played w/​the owner’s dog. Yet another, he didn’t even get off the bus. In fact he asked that we break into separate groups so as not to alert the winery to the fact that he had brought his tour group there. Our last stop was in Carlton where he waited by the bus and dispersed the group to explore on our own.
Bottom line — this tour was a glorified shuttle service. You can get that for a lot cheaper. I paid a premium and hoped for
— presence at wineries visited (to say the least)
— commentary & pointers on the wines
— background stories on wineries visited
— personal relationships with winery to get comped tasting fees and/​or special access to reserve tastings /​reserve rooms
— cheese platters /​snacks to accompany tasting
I called Wayne following the tour to discuss my dissatisfaction.
Regarding his lack of presence he said: «Do you expect me to hold your hand??» No, but is it too much to ask a tour guide to be present for the tour?
Regarding lack of snacks promised on website he said: «Lichini [Winery] provided a snacks. I saw you chowing down.» Chowing down?!? Talk about rude. We visited 6 wineries, 1 full day, no food. Of course we were hungry.
Other things I noticed — he provided a cooler with water and beer. That’s right — BEER. Why anyone would provide beer at an educational wine tour is beyond me.
Wayne did end up comping me $ 75 but I would have preferred he just give a proper tour to begin with.

This is an incredible wine tour, not just for the informed wine enthusiast but also for newbies. Wayne is very knowledgeable and down to earth. He has relationships with many of the best winemakers and will work with you to customize an itinerary that will make the most of your time. He’ll even take you into wineries that are appointment only. We really appreciate his show
and felt better having someone who actually owns a wine shop and internet distribution company spending time to educate us about all things wine. If you want someone with expertise, this is your guy.
Take this tour and have FUN. The price is more than reasonable compared to the competition and you’ll have a stellar day being immersed in Oregon’s wine country. Now we just need to drink all the wine we bought. Thanks Wayne!

I joined in on a tour via a Living Social deal. It was exactly what I was looking for. I’ve done a lot of wine tasting and buying in the Willamette Valley — Dundee — McMinnville area the past few years. I was hoping we wouldn’t go to the same old places. First, we were a group of 5 clients so we went in the mini-​van, which I highly prefer to a limo. On the back roads to the wineries, a mini-​van or small bus make perfect sense. We visited Carlton first and stopped in at shops where I have never tasted. While most of the tasting fees are waived, expect to pay some fees.
Wayne was very knowledgeable about the history, terroir, and wines. He has a big personality, but in a good way. He keeps up the patter in wine van but at the tastings we mostly heard from the tasting room staff, who in almost all cases were extremely interesting.
This is an all-​day excursion, and with a small group he provide us turkey sandwiches. We stopped at 6 shops or vineyards for tastings.
I felt like I learned a lot, even though I know my Oregon wines. It was a fun day and I would definitely go again. Wayne says the tour can be completely different every time.

He calls himself «The Wizard of Wine»…
To me, he is almost the polar opposite… he demystifies wine. He breaks down wine into simple terms and takes the mystery (and pretention) out of it…
He has a small shop on SE Alder that is floor to ceiling wines… mostly from smaller wineries that you won’t find at Freddy’s or Albertsons. And he’s not going to try and upsell you wine… he actually talked me out of a $ 35 pinot, and instead guided me to a $ 18 bottle… you could’ve knocked me over with a feather!
He also teaches classes and gives wine tours. He is a hoot and a half, and highly recommended!