On Oregon Time

This is the hottest part of the day and it takes some getting used to.

Forget that mid-afternoon east coast heat thing, here heat reigns supreme from 5 on, a fact I need to remind my brain daily. Several people have confirmed it to us.

Out on a brief morning walk (which took me by a side street gun shop, what the hell, Oregon?), I passed a guy wearing a Lamb of God t-shirt. Instead of saying good morning, I said I was from Richmond, Virginia. I got a delighted grin and laughter in return..

But I can't be out walking and making commentary on locals all day, because we had wine to taste. Today's first stop was St. Innocent, where a funny and charming winemaker named Mark regaled us with all kinds of stories.

The name comes from a relative whose middle name was Innocent, a fact he kept hidden because of some big St. Innocent Day massacre (see how historically educational travel can be?) which gave the name a negative connotation for years.

Like many winemakers out here, he liked to brag about his highest elevation vineyards, but I was also struck by his vocabulary for describing wine, which knew no limits. Best description of a wine heard all day: "It's complex. It's an intellectual orgasm in your mouth."

When it was time to leave, we asked for a lunch recommendation and he supplied one. "You can plug it into your GPS or I could draw you a map," he offered. Of course I took him up on the map drawing, watching as he made wavy lines for the river and misspelled "corthouse."

I had him sign it and it's my favorite souvenir of the trip so far.

But he was right on about Kitchen on Court, a Belgian chef-driven spot in Salem with hand-cut burgers that alone were worth the trip. Around us, young legislative aid types took stock of each other and asked questions like, "Will you be at my party this weekend?"

At Left Coast Winery, we met Luke, a much younger winemaker, who piled us into his truck for a vineyard tour to show off his "babies."

Even more fun were the owners, a delightful couple, both of whom took to me like a fat kid to cake. She used to work in publishing, so we talked Richard Brautigan's "The Pill versus the Springjhll Mining Disaster," how she'd met Ferlinghetti and why Leonard Cohen currently yours the coast ("Suzanne is an amazing song still").

Her husband, a taciturn man with a wry wit and piercing blue eyes, made sure my glass stayed filled and smiled at me a lot.

It was coming back through the shank of the early evening, meaning the hottest part of the day, that I once again had to recalibrate my brain to deal with the endless sunshine and heat.

Where exactly are these gray Oregon skies we've been brainwashed to expect?

While I got a disco nap, my partner in crime went to a nearby tasting room to gather intel, returning with explicit instructions from a local to find the 411 and try their steamed clams.

He was right, the enormous bowl of fat clams was outstanding, as was my seafood saute with shrimp, clams and halibut in a broth of butter and white wine. The little restaurant was a gem with terrific food, ridiculously low prices on food and wine and an affable server who was in no rush.

Nor are we, given it's vacation. We closed out the evening at a local billiards bar of which we'd been warned not to go in there after 6:00. On walking in, we found a guy wrestling another in his underwear. Outside, a couple sobbed in each other's arms. The people-watching was extraordinary, the drinks cheap. We got front row seats to it all.

Today began at the Elizabeth Chambers tasting room a few blocks away. We'd missed our appointment yesterday, so today we came bearing locally baked cookies to make up for it.

Our pourer was an Oregon come-here who'd fallen hard for the land of mossy rooves and gray skies. She spoke of keeping Oregon's wine scene small, extolling the pleasures of working in a tiny boutique winery after serving time in one of the big boys.

She was the best kind of advertisement for the pleasures of Oregon's laid back, groovy winemaking scene. Here, everyone is on "Oregon time," it seems.

At Sass Winery, we got to meet Jerry and Jerry, the father and son team who make a limited supply of wines in a building that would fit inside some other wineries' stock rooms.

On the white board calendar was a notation for today, "Tasting 1:30." that referred to us. Pulling fresh bottles down from the stacks of wine in cartons, he poured his wines for us in the middle of his work space.

Sass won my heart for being the real deal, by far the smallest and simplest of all the wine outfits we visited. Jerry the elder cracked me up with his definition of most winemakers: "Boring people with big egos."

By the way, he's the winemaker, too.

He led us back to where barrels of wine sat aging, extracting tastes from various vineyards to demonstrate differences in locations, clones and vintages.

It was funny because his son Jerry had left for lunch not long after we'd arrived. When he returned, he put classical music on the sound system and immediately got to work. Father Jerry grinned at us. "Thanks for being here or it would have been hip hop at 80 or 89 decibels. Can you stay?"

Alas, no, it was time to fuel up and his lunch recommendation was Acme, a diner-like place where we had Old Bay-spiced Oregon shrimp cakes (only 2800 miles to eat Old Bay, go figure) and then carbed up to classic rock.

We'd passed Mel's Ice cream every day since we got to wine country and today I'd been promised a visit. The place claimed to be only 30 years old but had the patina of dirt and cutesies that seemed to indicate a much older tenure in the space.

Waiting for our ice creams to come out we noticed a glass wall with bars on the side and, sure enough, there was a live monkey inside. Grated, he was half hidden ina  towel as if to stay out of sight of gawking tourists, but definitely live. Why Alf's is home to wildlife, we have no idea. Must be an Oregon thing.

Like this crazy evening heat that's got me carrying an umbrella to walk down sunny streets. Going to dinner at 9:00 in full daylight. By the time I'm finally adjusted to the Oregonian way, it'll be time to go home.

Pity. Next trip out this way, I intend to carry a pink parasol.