Our last distillery tour for this Kentucky Bourbon Trail adventure is Woodford Reserve, just a few miles from our campground. It is super hot and the tour is almost all outside, but the guide was merciful and tried to find shade at every stop.
The grounds are beautiful and although Woodford Reserve is a "new" bourbon brand, the property has the oldest continually operating still in the original building. While the tour was good, despite the ridiculous weather, we REALLY enjoyed the tasting.
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| Beautiful historic stone buildings - a warehouse |
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| A specialty bourbon that is put in oak barrels twice |
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| The actual distillers, removing the alcohol from the mash |
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| A vat of mash, bubbling from the yeast |
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| The Woodford Reserve barrels are made in house and are more attractive than the other distilleries that just slap a barcode label on their aging barrels. |
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| Love the stone buildings |
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| The "high tech" way of moving the barrels from one place to another - train type tracks and GRAVITY! |
Our guide was a sensory expert and explained the subtleties of "nosing" the bourbon and instructed us how to sip and taste the underlying flavors beyond the alcohol "burn" that may be florals, spice, oakiness, fruits, etc. We also experimented with the way a small piece of chocolate changes the taste of the bourbon. Some bourbons were enhanced by the chocolate and one tasted odd. As usual, at the end of the tasting, we visited the gift shop and relieved them of a few bottles.
Returning to the campground for happy hour, we sat outside by the river long enough for one cocktail, then we succumbed to the heat and went back to our air-conditioned campers. We said our goodbyes as we were leaving in the morning to head to Alabama to get our recliners installed in the RV and Melinda and Joe were heading back to South Carolina to celebrate Father's Day weekend at a local campground.
We loved this short trip and really enjoyed sharing it with Joe and Melinda - we vowed to do it again, maybe next Spring. We may revisit here as there are many, many more boutique distilleries we could explore or we may investigate something completely different. Maybe wine?
Happy Trails to everyone this summer!
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