Tuesday we visited the Four Roses Bottling Plant and saw the bottling process from the full barrels coming in to the empty barrels going out. But the inbetween part was the best. This barrel has had the bung removed and a whiskey thief inserted into the hole to assure smooth flowage over the trough. The brown you see is liquid gold (click on the picture) and our tour guide collected some of the unfiltered bourbon and we got to taste. A little 120 proof bourbon at 10:00 in the morning wasn't so bad!!
After lunch we visited Jim Beam Distillery, the largest distillery of bourbon in the U.S. This warehouse is like all the rest that dot the countryside, nine stories high with 50,000 to 70,000 53 gallon barrels stacked inside. Who drinks all that bourbon?
The warehouses are great to go into. They smell bourbony, are neither heated nor air conditioned, are dimly lit, and have marvelous history. Our tour guide said with a recliner and a large screen TV, this would be the ultimate "man cave." Just imagine!!This is the end of our Sippin' trip--we're heading back to Minnesota for our niece's wedding. We left this morning with the sky streaked with lightning and plenty of rain--good timing. It was a great trip, thanks to Ellen and Art for the great planning. We enjoyed the company of old friends and new, and we'll go back to Kentucky again someday.
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