The falls are just the start.
Columbia Gorge waterfalls, Willamette pinot, downtown food carts and a city that runs on good beer. What each tour is actually like, what it costs, and where to book it.
Seven bookings you’ll be glad you made.
First visit or tenth, these are the ones people come home talking about: the Multnomah Falls loop, a pinot afternoon in the valley, a donut-and-food-cart crawl no map shows you.
Columbia River Gorge Waterfalls Tour from Portland, OR
Portland to Gorge waterfalls in 4 hours: Crown Point Vista House, Latourell, Multnomah, and Horsetail. Small group van tour for $89.
From $89 per person
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Six waterfalls before lunch.
Forty-five minutes east of downtown the Columbia carves a thousand-foot gorge, and the road along it strings one waterfall after another. Multnomah drops 620 feet in two tiers; Wahkeena, Latourell and Horsetail fill the gaps. Half a day, and you have seen the reason people move here.
Which Gorge day is yours?
Everyone wants the waterfalls; how far you push past them is the real choice. Three honest ways to spend the day east of the city, each one broken down below with prices and what travelers actually thought.
The waterfall loop
The classic falls day
4 hours (approx.) · from $73 · 2,108 reviews
A van out of downtown, then the historic highway one waterfall at a time: Latourell, Bridal Veil, Wahkeena, and Multnomah for as long as you want to stand under it. Easy walking, no white-knuckle driving, home by dinner. If you do one thing outside the city, do this.
Compare the waterfall tours →
Add the mountain
The Mount Hood version
8 hours 30 minutes (approx.) · from $133 · 695 reviews
Same falls, then keep going. Up to Hood River for the fruit-loop orchards, around the north side of an 11,000-foot volcano, Timberline Lodge if the road is clear. A longer day with real elevation and the postcard cone over your shoulder the whole way.
See the Mount Hood days →
On the water
The jetboat run
1 hour 30 minutes (approx.) · 35 reviews
Skip the highway and take the river itself. A flat-bottomed jetboat up the Columbia between the basalt walls, spray off the bow, the falls seen from below for a change. Fast, loud, and the opposite of a coach seat. Best on a warm afternoon.
See the jetboat trips →
Old Town keeps its secrets underground.
Below the sidewalks of the old waterfront run the Shanghai Tunnels, where sailors were once taken against their will. Add a haunted pub or two and Portland at night stops being twee and turns genuinely strange. Go with someone who knows which doors open.
The food is on the sidewalk.
Portland eats from carts: whole city blocks of them, a hundred kitchens deep, plus the voodoo-donut line and the Salt & Straw scoop. Book a guide who walks you past the tourist stalls to the ones locals line up for.
More breweries than any city on earth.
Portland pours more beer per square mile than anywhere, and the pub tours know the taprooms worth your afternoon. Hoppy IPAs in the Pearl, cellar sours in a converted warehouse, a pint with the brewer if you time it right.
Pinot country starts an hour south.
The Willamette Valley grows some of the best pinot noir on the planet, and the tasting rooms sit among the vines an easy drive from town. Let a driver handle the winding roads between Dundee and the Eola Hills while you work through the flights and the view.
One city, a whole state to raid.
Portland is the base; the good days fan out from it. The Gorge for waterfalls. The valley for wine. Mount Hood for snow in July. The coast for haystack rock and cold Pacific air, all inside a morning's drive.
Know what you’re after?
Twelve doors into the same city and state. Pick the one that sounds like your kind of day, and the tours behind it are all rated, priced and ready to book.
An early start, a bigger day.
The best of Oregon is a day trip, not a second vacation. Waterfalls, a snow-capped volcano, pinot vineyards, a state-park canyon and the coast are each a morning's drive, and the return seat is part of the deal.
Three days from Portland, done well.
Nobody sees all of Oregon in one visit, but three days from Portland covers the greatest hits. Here is how we’d spend them for a friend flying into PDX tomorrow.
Day 1
The city, on foot and by fork
Coffee and a donut downtown, a food-cart lunch, Powell’s and the neighborhoods by afternoon, a brewery or a haunted pub after dark. Ease into it while the jet lag is still useful.
Plan day one →
Day 2
The Gorge and the mountain
East on the historic highway for the waterfalls, then up toward Hood River and Mount Hood if the road is open. Big scenery, easy walking, back in town by evening for a proper dinner.
Plan day two →
Day 3
Wine country, or the coast
South to the Willamette Valley for pinot among the vines, or west to Cannon Beach and Haystack Rock. Either way, let someone else drive so the tasting flight or the sea air is the whole point.
Plan day three →
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