The world of whisky tourism has moved on, and far faster than a hairy adolescent could keep up on his bike.
Another Scotch Odyssey is required, readers, although I’m afraid the only visions of Scotland and single malts will be virtual and imaginary as I trawl through the websites and phone up some relevant people associated with each of the distilleries I visited this spring. Upon my recent visit to Pulteney I discovered that they have since introduced two more specialised tours, in addition to their standard offering. This was significant and I sent out tendrils in attempt to divine the level of evolution within the Scotch malt visitor centres in the six months since I pedalled away from Bladnoch. (Has it been that long?)
It would appear that the choices available for how you might tour a distillery are becoming as varied as the expressions on their lovingly-arranged shop shelves. From initial investigation, Diageo in particular, receivers of some criticism from me for certain sites, has implemented what can only be described as a complete overhaul of their visitor experience. Prices, features and components have been altered or completely redeveloped. The Discovering Distilleries website has been given a facelift in keeping with this new ambition to provide the interested punter with a more thorough and original encounter.
This, as you can imagine, shall be an ongoing process. It is a necessary one, however, because I wish for you all to know about the efforts being made to make your visit to a particular distillery – and Scotland in a wider sense – as memorable as the favourite dram that may have brought you there. These amendments shall be made directly to the original reviews found under ‘The Tours’ category listing. My own experiences from April and May shall be preserved alongside, for whilst they may have since become out-dated in terms of factual content, I believe that they still have a role to play as a narrative of my travels.
In this way I hope that the Scotch Odyssey Blog can continue to provide all the relevant facts you might need for planning your next trip to a distillery, and make you laugh at the same time.