Planning a Trip

Getting There

Yakima is on I-82 at the junction with U.S. 12, which connects to I-5 south of Centralia. You can also get to Yakima on U.S. 97 (from Ellensburg from the north and just east of The Dalles, Oregon, from the south).

The Yakima Air Terminal/McAllister Field, 2400 W. Washington Ave., on the southern outskirts of town, is served by Horizon Air.

Visitor Information

Contact the Yakima Valley Visitors & Convention Bureau, 10 N. Eighth St., Yakima, WA 98901 (tel. 800/221-0751 or 509/575-3010; www.visityakima.com). For information on Toppenish, contact the Toppenish Chamber of Commerce, 5A S. Toppenish Ave. (P.O. Box 28), Toppenish, WA 98948 (tel. 800/863-6375 or 509/865-3262; www.toppenish.net).

Festivals

Red Wine and Chocolate, held each year over the Presidents' Day weekend, marks the start of the wine-tasting season at Yakima Valley wineries. The annual Spring Barrel Tasting on the last weekend in April is Yakima's biggest wine festival. During this event, the previous year's vintages are often tasted before being bottled. The Catch the Crush event, in late September, and Thanksgiving in Wine Country, in November, are both big wine-tasting weekends. Each year over the Fourth of July weekend, the Toppenish Pow Wow & Rodeo (tel. 509/865-5566; www.toppenishrodeo.com) brings crowds of people to Toppenish to watch broncobusters and Native American dances. On the fourth full weekend in September, the skies over Prosser fill with hot-air balloons in the Great Prosser Balloon Rally.