Great little spot with beautiful landscaping by man and nature. The evening meals were prepared to perfection and the wait staff excellent. The only problem I found was they seemed to be a bit under staffed.

My husband booked us a room at the Columbia Gorge Hotel online on the recommendation of a friend. Upon first arriving, I thought the location RIGHT off of I-84 was disappointing and the hotel itself does not appear to be a 5-star building from outside appearances. However, the grounds are nicely landscaped and the hotel is right on the gorge with lovely views and a nice waterfall running (which was nice to listen to as we slept in our room at night).
This is a historic hotel, so everything inside appears as you can imagine it did for its first travelers in the early 1900's. Everything is very well maintained and the staff are very attentive. We were celebrating our anniversary and it was a nice touch that they have a board in the lobby listing all of the guests who are staying there that are celebrating anniversaries or birthdays, etc. Our room was very comfortable with a Tempurpedic bed, large bathroom with an EXCELLLENT shower (great shower head and water pressure), and comfy robes provided. We had a view of the river, although we were on a lower floor, so not the best view. The room also had a flat-screen TV with internet TV and movie access. Unfortunately they are still working out the kinks on that system, so we spent a frustrating amount of time trying to get the internet TV to work. We finally figured it out ourselves after the nice bellman tried to assist us.
They offered a daily social hour hosted every afternoon in front of the cozy lounge where there is a large fireplace to congregate around. They served free featured drinks- wine one day (unlimited number of glasses) and then champagne the next along with appetizers- a nice plate of cheeses on one occasion and a hummus plate the next.
The package (very well-priced at under $300/night) we got included dinner and breakfast and the food here is FABULOUS. They are known for their 5 or 6-course "Farm Breakfast" on Sundays. But, we really enjoyed all of our meals and the service was top notch. They did not put a limit on what we could order at meals, so that was impressive, we expected to be given a set menu to choose from, but we got to order off of the regular menu and multiple courses too.
What stood out to me overall during our entire stay is that this hotel makes a great effort to provide a lot of additional little niceties and takes care of the details (like high end soap products, the internet TV, etc.) without making you feel like they are trying to nickel and dime you to death. This is truly a 5-star hotel in every way and I highly recommend it for any special occasion or just a night out.
Finally it's location is also excellent near Hood River, several wineries, and lots of hiking trails nearby for active folks.

We stayed at the Columbia Gorge for one night of a two-night "mini-vacation" to enjoy spring time in the Hood River area. Our room was nice -- very comfortable although not deluxe. And the famous many-course breakfast the next morning was nice. However, our experience at dinner convinced us that we won't stay here again.

As we frequently do in restaurants, we asked the waiter if we could share one entree, and he replied that we could but there would be a "slight extra charge." Although many restaurants don't charge anything extra for sharing an entree, we have also found it not unusual to pay $3 or $4 additional for this (and in that case usually there are additional vegetables, etc., added to the second plate). So we went ahead and ordered. Well, despite the extra charge we got nothing additional on the second plate -- just the original small portion of veggies split in two (and my husband got all four of the stalks of asparagus!). That would have been okay, however, but when we got the check we discovered that the "slight extra charge" was actually $12.85 -- for splitting an entree that was around $25.00! And the waiter wasn't even very pleasant when we expressed our surprise at the large amount.

When we got home two days later my husband wrote to the hotel/restaurant manager telling of our surprise at and dissatisfaction with the LARGE additional charge. We never received any reply to this letter. Because of the management's apparent lack of concern for guest satisfaction, we do not plan to ever stay here again.

We went to Hood River for a family wedding which was being held at the hotel. We decided to stay there just because it was easy. I booked a room with a garden view. The view consisted of the parking lot and a couple of trees. The outside of the hotel was beautiful as was the wedding. The staff was attentive, friendly and courteous. The service was wonderful. Our room was small, the furniture old. The windows didn't work and there was mold around the bath tub. The food and drinks at the hotel are very over priced. The world famous breakfast was so-so. Usually these things don't bother us but for the price we paid for the room we weren't expecting mold and so-so food. We were expecting a little more. The hotel is way over rated and I would not stay there again. In fact, we left a night early and went to a different hotel.