Day 19 Friday July 10 Whiskey tour and Nessie Search

Day 19 Friday, July 10 Inverewe Gardens & Glen Orn Whiskey Distillery - Search for Nessie

Seems I put our search for Nessie in yesterday's tour..actually it was today.

One of the easy days when we don’t have to rush to get the bags out and head off to a new City. We do get on the ‘coach’, but this time to tour and back to the same hotel. Some of us are getting a bit weary, particularly those who are on their second tour. Many from Australia, New Zealand and some from the U.S.A. have already done a tour in Europe, the United States or western Canada. They are indeed a hardy bunch.

The weather holds up as we head off along the shores of Loch Maree to Inverewe Gardens. This is as far north as we go and we are at the same latitude as Labrador and Moscow. This explains the very long hours of daylight but not the vegetation, plants etc. we see in the gardens. There are plants from around the world, including Canadian pines, and subtropical plants that thrive because of the warm gulf stream. It is an interesting walk bordering the Sea and the only drawback are the small, biting insects, akin to sand fleas and black flies, that are attracted to the flowering plants and the sweet aroma. Guide Michael refers to them as “no-see-ums” a terms also used in Canada.

We drive back south along Loch Glascarnoch and stop for some scenic photos along the way at Loch Broon and the Loch Moor Valley. While we see a lot more open, rural land areas than expected it is pointed out that not an inch of Great Britain has not been lived upon, mined, or built upon over the centuries. The many expansive barren fields and hills, now populated everywhere with sheep, were once heavily forested, often with oak. Even the famous and blooming heather was actually planted during the Elizabethan times. There is a great deal of reforestation underway throughout Great Britain and Ireland. The roads are again extremely narrow and winding.

Our next stop is the Glen Ord distillery which I find extremely interesting. Emily, our young guide, is a local and working during a University break where she is studying opera singing in Glasgow. We follow the entire process to the end where the whiskey is stored in thousands of barrels. Only about 5% of the 200 million litres of alcohol produced is used for their single malt Glen Ord brand. The rest is used for blended whiskeys like Johnny Walker, or Baileys, gin etc. We see the barrels where the alcohol is stored in casks from Kentucky (bourbon barrels) or Spain (Sherry). After storage of 12 years the contents are ’married’ on a 50/50 basis to make their whiskey. The barrels are purchased in Kentucky and Spain, taken apart for shipping, and put reassembled by Coopers. They store the filled casks in over 50 sites across Great Britain. Apparently the coopers are paid by the cask and the record to reassemble a cask currently stands at about 7 & 1/2 minutes.

Back to the hotel and then many of us head off on an optional, but far from free, search by boat for Nessie, the famous Loch Ness monster. We start with an interesting museum visit where the history of Nessie sightings and scientific investigations are presented and then board boats to search for ourselves. Alas, no sightings. There is a myth that Saint Columba, one of Saint Patrick’s desciples, holds the record for the first sighting, and he drove the monster off with a crucifix (doesn’t just work for vampires). We dine at the local Nessie hotel, the Drumnadrochit..have not a clue as to how to pronounce it. First meal of fish and chips and it is in Scotland..and not great. Back to Inverness and pack for the drive to Edinburgh.