Torii Mor Winery

My third stop on Sunday was Torii Mor.  I’ve tasted one or two of their wines in the past but knew little about them.  While talking to people in other tasting rooms on the previous Friday, it had been mentioned several times.  The tasting room had been created with a Japanese influence.  The facility had been feng shui -ed (I’m pretty sure that’s not correct use! (-:) and I had been told it was a very peaceful place.  This winery is actually in the same direction as Erath so if you plan to go it would be easy to visit both wineries in the same trip.

I enjoyed the drive to this winery because it was well off the main road.  The approach is through some wooded areas along a gravel road and then you eventually break out into the vineyards.  While traveling this road I noticed several turkey vultures circling above.  Although I do not care for these birds (they are so very ugly!) they amaze me.  They are a huge bird with fringed wings and when you see them circling you know exactly what they are.  If you are unfortunate enough to see them on the ground you realize they are even larger than they appear in the air and they have the ugliest red heads/faces.  My sister tells a story of years ago being out in a country park sunbathing.  When she and her friend looked up they noticed these birds circling over them!  Scary! They immediately jumped up to prove they were still alive! :-) While driving towards the winery I saw one of the birds dive and wondered what little piece of carrion it had discovered. 

To my dismay there was one sitting on the fence directly to the right of the winery sign!  I ignored it and drove in past the Asian-styled gates.   I think the grounds around the tasting room were very nice – pools and water features could be seen but inside was very crowded.  When I arrived there was one other couple and the three of us barely fit in the tasting room.  The room had quite a lot of furniture in it but since no one was sitting we had to keep dancing around each other.  I also found the staff to be not friendly – not unfriendly – just not friendly.  Neutral, I guess.  There was a $5 fee for the tasting so, as I had done in every other tasting room, I handed over my charge card and requested they just hang on to it so that if I purchased wine I’d just have one charge slip.  About a minute later the guy handed me a $5 charge slip to sign! 

I tried a Pinot Gris and three Pinot Noir.  I’m not going to provide tasting notes because I was feeling so uncomfortable here that I believe my tasting was influenced by the conditions.  However, I will tell you that with all the good Oregon Pinots out there I won’t be rushing to try these again any time soon. 

When I left the winery I turned out into the road and now my one turkey vulture had multiplied and there were six of them sitting on posts in the vineyard near the road!  One was actually in the road working on its lunch.  He was hesitant to leave it long enough for me to drive by but finally let it go.  I stopped to take a couple of photos but there was no way I was getting out of my car!  Unfortunately this meant that I was taking shots up at them with the cloudy but bright sky behind them – not exactly good photo conditions.  Anyway, I just thought that it was very odd that the winery that had taken time to be laid out according to ancient traditions was the one with vultures outside their door!  I think they didn’t quite do it right! :-)

Next stop:  Ponzi Tasting Room and Dundee Bistro