Public transport and Glengoyne

Across the road from Glengoyne

It is amazing to me how far out the public transport will bring passengers.  Perhaps I'm just amazed because I've never taken the MBTA out past Medford, but today I rode a bus through the countryside..  A public transport bus...  It was amazing!  I was fairly amazed at how far out we went when I went for paintball last week, but this seemed to be even farther.  It might be because we had to walk another mile and a half to the paintball place while this bus dropped us off right across the street.

Signage outside Glengoyne

Distillery from the road.

The white buildings are very visible from the road, although there is a sharp turn nearby in the road that makes it harder to see.  This distillery originally had it's own malting floor as well.  I think the tour guide said they don't do it at all anymore, but its quite common in Islay to have a backup supply in case there's bad weather or something and malted barley is hard to get shipped there.

Me with the stills.

The distillery has one large distillation pot for the first wash which brings the alcohol percentage from the 8% fermented wort to 25% forming the "wine", I think.  Or at least something about wine...  This is then split between the two distillers on the right of this image.  The entire production of Glengoyne, therefore, comes from these three stills.  It's pretty amazing, considering they can make 1 million liters per year.  The tour guide did bring up the amazing fact that some grain distilleries can produce 1 million liters in 3 days...  Apparently at Glengoyne , the actual distillation rate is the slowest of any Scotch whiskey.  This should lead to mellow flavors with little or no off-flavors from the malt itself.  The tour guide also said he had tried the pure, unaged stuff and said he was surprised how sweet/alcoholic, but unharsh the flavor was.  It is clear when it comes from the stills, but picks up all its character from the wood in the casks it which it is aged.  You can tell that by looking at whiskeys of different ages.  The oldest being the darkest in color.
Another interesting point is that Glengoyne no longer gets all of its water from this little brook behind the property.  They actually pump water in from a reservoir on the other side of the hill, but still use this water supply for some cooling and final dillution when filling the casks.

Old water source.

The first dram.

I had to get back for a teleconference, so I didn't have time to spend any money in the store, but I had a chance to sample the 17 y/o.  It's fantastic!  If you want a mellow dessert Scotch, this one is great.  Even one of the PhD students who came with me thought the 17 year was good.. and she made a (barely noticeable) horrible face at the 10 year! haha! Sorry Victoria!