We love Scotch Whisky. Which kind you ask? Speyside, Lowland, Highland, Cambeltown, Islay? Yes, please. Why be choosy? The triumph of “and” over the tyranny of “or.” We love them all. But our favorites tend to be from the Isle of Islay. And that means large amounts of peat and smoke. It’s a family thing.
For this leg of our journey, we were met by S’s parents (whom we also bumped into while in Ireland and Northern Ireland) and S’s sister and her husband. See, we told you…it’s a family thing.
First things first. How do you properly pronounce Islay? Is it IS-lay? Is it EYE-lay? Is it eye-LA? Well really its none of the above. In Gaelic, the island name is spelled Ile or Ila (we saw it both ways). And to the locals, it’s EYE-luh, but since they’re friendly sorts – they’re just happy you arrived to try their pride and joy.
We started in Edinburgh. We walked the Royal Mile. We walked Calton Hill. We sat in pubs drinking scotch and listening to local music. We discovered a burgeoning gin scene and sampled the product from some local distillers, but this was all prelude to the real reason for the trip. Our journey to the Isle of Islay and her whisky distilleries.
Edinburgh is on the eastern edge of Scotland, while Islay is on the far western edge. Only 12 miles from Northern Ireland at the closest point (as we pointed out in our last post about Ireland). As such our trip began with a van ride through the southern part of the highlands with a day one goal of catching the ferry to Islay.
Our only real stop the first day was for a lunch break in the seaside town of Oban. We were given 90 minutes to grab lunch and hit the Oban distillery. After some fresh catch of the day, we hightailed it to the Oban distillery. Although not part of Islay, Oban is a favorite. We skipped the whisky tour and headed straight for the upstairs tasting room. As a family, we got 3 flights of Oban favorites (4 tastes per flight) and got busy comparing and identifying our favorites.
Our van was first onto the ferry followed by what must have been 50 cars, vans and trucks of all sizes. The ferry crew expertly guided all the vehicles into place and we were ready to cruise. The captain of this monster vessel is a real pro. No ferry that big, carrying that much weight, should be as easy to guide as our captain made it look. He eased the ferry out of the dock, did a 180 turn in place, raced to Islay, repeated the 180 turn and guided the ferry into the dock at Islay. No drama amazingly, given the tight spaces into which the captain had to fit this monster ferry. He deserved a nice glass of scotch afterwards!
Or maybe there was drama and we missed it. We were blissfully unawares as our brother in law bought a bottle of Bowmore which we happily sipped with light snacks during our ferry ride.
Once off the ferry, we raced speedily to our accommodations for the next few nights. We stayed at the Bowmore cottages. These are old homes formerly reserved for workers at the Bowmore distillery and now functions more like a hotel for visiting guests. The wonderful white buildings are located right on the Bowmore grounds, mere feet from the Bowmore tasting room. Our cottage was known as the Malt Man’s home. Malting requires continuous oversight and precision, which means living on site. And true to its name, our home for the next 3 nights was perfectly perfumed by the aromas of peat smoke and malted barley.
We will spare you all the details, but distilling scotch is very similar to the process of making beer. Simple ingredients: water, barley, yeast. There are some extra steps in making scotch: smoking the barley, grinding the barley, double distillation, higher alcohol content and aging (to name a few). Even some of the terminology is the same. Scotch distillers even refer to their barley tea (our term) as wort.
So, what makes one distillery different from the other? Lots of things. Their water source. Their peat source. The yeast they use. The malting and peating processes are similar but has some variances. The water temperatures are slightly different during the process of making wort. Though one of the biggest differences (if not the biggest difference) was the shape of the stills themselves. The shape of still affects taste because each shape allows different flavors to either rise through the still, never leave the pot or fall into specially designed traps.
The most striking similarity was that the barley and the malting process are not viewed as proprietary. Some barley even comes from outside of Islay. But malting the barley (warming in hot water and allowing the barley to sprout growth) requires large amounts of space, time and labor. As most of the distilleries are limited by space, they outsource the entire process to the Port Ellen facility (a former distillery owned by Diageo). With talk that Port Ellen may soon start distilling again, it’s unclear how the other distilleries will change their processes. Only Kilchoman grows and malts 100% of their own barley. But they’re a relatively new and smaller producer.
We had two full days of touring distilleries and tasting. The days were a perfect mix of touring, tasting and lunching at a distillery. In-between visits, we explored the beauty of the island.
On day one, we visited Bowmore, Kilchoman and Bruichladdich. Since we were staying at Bowmore, the commute was a stroll across the small parking lot. Bowmore was the first distillery in Islay and has the most famous aging vault. It’s apparently perfect in everyway and is still used for the premium spirits that Bowmore distills. We stopped for lunch at Kilchoman and for a tour and tasting. As part of lunch we ordered Cullen Skink (a smoked haddock soup). Trust us, it’s far more delicious that the name implies. And lastly we hit Bruichladdich, an older distillery that was closed for years and recently reopened. As such, their oldest spirits are less than 10 years old. But they made up for it by sharing with us their pride and joy – The Octomore. It’s the self proclaimed peat-iest scotch in the world. Some other distillers disputed that appellation, but there’s no mistaking that it was a peat bomb and quite delicious. S was a bit fearful to try it but loved it.
On day two, we visited Ardbeg, Lagavulin and Laphroaig. Ardbeg might have been our favorite distillery to visit. The grounds were lovely, our tour guide was excellent (she was still in college but her command of the subject matter was excellent) and our private tasting room was full of leather seats and dark wood. We also had an excellent lunch at Ardbeg. After our visit to Ardbeg, we went down to a beautiful and massive beach. It was one of the largest beaches we had ever seen. You don’t think of Scotland as having a “beautiful beach”, but it was. In fact, we were told that a resort in Thailand came over and photographed this beach. They enhanced it with more tropical coloring and used it as a stock beach photo of their resort in Thailand. Why? Because of the sheer size and because there were no people in the photo. Brilliant! Well until Scotland sued Thailand and won. Before Lagavulin, we stopped at a second short walk point from which we could see the remains of an old Viking castle. We could also see the Lagavulin distillery. S and our brother in law got overly excited and walked along the rocky and marshy coastline to the distillery. Lagavulin was the only distillery at which we didn’t take the tour. Instead, we sat in their tasting room and enjoyed flights of their finest scotches. And last but not least, we visited Laphroaig. This was the moment we had been waiting for! Laphroaig is our jam. Especially the 10 year. Anything older and it’s loses what makes Laphroaig special. As if we hadn’t sampled enough scotch in Ireland, Northern Ireland and the first 6 distilleries in Scotland, we bought a glass of Cairdeas. In Gaelic, Cairdeas means friendship. The scotch is finished in sherry and bourbon barrels so the color and flavors are quite unique. It’s quite simply marvelous.
This was a once in a lifetime trip and it was made extra special with the opportunity to share the adventure with family. This was the first time that just the six of us had taken a trip together (the nieces and nephew were dearly missed) and we are very grateful that our family were all able to make this happen. Sacrifices were made and worthy memories were the reward. Next time to the British Isles, we’ll have to do a tour of another scotch region. But which one? These are difficult decisions and ones on which we don’t always agree. But we will choose one because Scotch is a family thing.
Wearehere 