[music]
Hello! Now then, in this vlog we're going to address three things that people have
commented on: number one, people say it's always sunny in your vlogs in Scotland.
Well today it's definitely not sunny, it's absolutely chucking it down with
Scottish liquid sunshine! Number two, some people have said 'lots of steam traction,
great, but we'd like a bit of diesel action,' so today we're at a diesel
heritage railway. And then number three I've had a complaint about lack of
'leatherage,' and of course because of the... because of the rain we've got the the
leather pants back, so yeah, keeping my legs nice and dry and warm. So where are
we? We are in a Dufftown which is on the Malt Whisky Trail, and it seems a
bit rude to come to this area and not visit a couple of distilleries. So we
looked up online, and there's a great resource online - I'll link it in the description
below - it's called the malt whisky trail, and it shows you a lot of the
distilleries and things that you can visit. So we started off actually at the
Cooperage down the road here near Dufftown, and
that was really interesting... where they make the barrels that they keep the
whisky in to give the whisky its flavour, and all the processes... so that
was fantastically interesting. And what we're doing now is presenting you with a
kind of day out you can do. Now, there is a heritage railway called the Keith to
Dufftown railway or something like that - I'll again I'll link it in the
description below - they run heritage DMUs at weekends and
some weekdays as well in the holidays linking Dufftown and Keith. And in Dufftown you've got the Glenfiddich distillery
which is about five minutes walk from the station here, and then in Keith you
have the Strathisla distillery which is home to Chivas regal, and that
is about ten minutes walk from the from Keith station when you get there. So
you can actually do a combined heritage railway/whisky trail all together. So we
went to Glenfiddich this morning and had a look round the distillery
there and I'll show you some pictures of how we got on this morning at Glenfiddich:
The basic tour at Glenfiddich costs 10 pounds and it
includes three tastings or one miniature to take away. Here is where they mix the
barley with the hot spring water to produce a liquid called wort; that's then
put into these, these are called wash backs, where yeast is added and the
fermentation then turns the sugars in the wort to alcohol that produces a beer
called wash. The wash is then distilled; here are all the stills at Glenfiddich -
you notice they are different shapes, and that produces different flavours, and
it's the middle cut of the second distillation which goes into casks to
make whisky. The tour of course ends up with a tasting.
So that was the tour around Glenfiddich. I've actually cheated and driven the five-minute walk to
Dufftown station just because it's raining so hard, and there is a brilliant cafe
apparently at the Glenfiddich distillery, but also here in Dufftown you have the
Sidings cafe, and then if you can see through the window in those carriages -
those red carriages - the sidings cafe, so I'm gonna go a go and give that a try.
Ooooh!
Awwwww!!!!!!
Oooooh!!!!!
[music]
Aww! So that was a nice lunch at the Sidings in Dufftown and they do
gluten-free stuff for people who want gluten-free, I wanted a soup without
dairy in it and they did me a special suit without dairy, so a real thumbs up
to the Sidings Cafe in Dufftown. And there's a quite a big menu things like
Haggis Scotch eggs and all that kind of thing so yeah, really interesting menu.
You can see we were hosted in a couple of carriages here. So I I'm going to go
back and get Dougal from the van because there's no dogs inside - you can sit
outside with a dog... not the weather for sitting outside really - and yeah go and
get my ticket and then we'll go for a ride on the railway!
[Music and general ambient sounds]
[voices of drunk people - and children. Swearing beeped out]
So if you're doing be distillery tour you would get up here at Keith and you can
visit the Strathisla distillery. Now because I've got Dougal I'm not
doing that today, I did that the other day. Now if you think you've done one
distillery at all you've done them all, you really need to do this one
at Strathisla, the one I did a couple of days ago. We'll go back to that now it
was a much sunnier day than it was right now, and I had a fantastic time, and this
is how we got on...
Strathisla claims to be the oldest operating distillery in
Scotland; it's certainly the most pretty! It really is in a gorgeous setting.
The basic tour costs fifteen pounds - that includes four tastings - but I would
heartily recommend the one that I went on, that's called the Blending Experience
and that costs sixty pounds. Here at Strathisla you can see we were actually
allowed to open up and look inside wash backs - the the older wash backs that
they've got - here are stills that they have which are compact to fit in with
the building - very interesting. And then this is where they take the middle cuts
of the second distillation, to put into casts to make the whisky. After
the distillery tour we were taken into the warehouse for the tasting, and on the
blending experience we were offered five tastings of premium whiskies. Because I
was driving I was given these to take away which is a brilliant idea. From
there we went into the blending room and this is where the fun really started - you
could actually blend your own whisky and of course if you weren't driving you can
even taste your own blend. And then when you made your whisky you took your
20cl bottle home with you it was really good fun!
[music]
Right so that was the Strathisla distillery hereat Keith town. Obviously if you
don't have a dog you could do that, but right now we are gonna get back on the
train and head back to Dufftown. Ready Dougs? Get back on the train.
[music and ambient sounds]
So this is Drammuir, and it says over there there is a sidings walk, so I think this
might be an opportunity to come back at some point and explore what walking is
available. Over there I see a sign that says 'community woodland' and there's some
carving there, so I think this is definitely a place that deserves further
exploration.
[engine sounds, train horn]
[music and ambient sounds]
Right, so that is us back at Dufftown. So this is a really good day out; a whisky
tour with a difference, The Whisky Train, which is... you can do Glenfiddich one end
and you can do Strathisla on the other end, and like I said earlier the
Strathisla tour is fantastic and if you think you've done one distillery tour you've
done them all I definitely recommend you do that one that we did. I'll put all the
details in the description below of what we've been up to, but I hope you enjoyed
that. As ever, if you did, you know what to do - give us the thumbs up, subscribe if
you don't already, it just leaves me to say from Dougal and from me:
Thanks for tuning in!
There, did you enjoy that Dougal? Did you enjoy that? Did you...? Did...?
[chuckles]
He never smiles!
[music and ambient sounds]