Brocation 2023, Pt. III

(contd.) 

We had another intense day of distillery tours on our plate as we entered our final, full day of Brocation '23, so everyone rose early to get a head start on the day.

This giant-ass moth (or whatever) was just hanging out on the bricks right outside me and Morgan's room. Pretty sure it was carnivorous.

Headed down for the ol' continental breakfast.

Loading up on calories. Morgan, Collier, Erik, Omkar and Mitch (Tom was having a rough morning, apparently.)

After loading up some mini-coolers for the road, we set off throughout the rolling hills of Kentucky towards our first stop of the day: Maker's Mark.

After about a half an hour on the road - not too shabby at all - we pulled into the distillery parking lot.

Here you go, folks - a historical signpost. Educate yourself.

Some old barn or something. I don't think it's in use, it looks too decrepit to serve as barrel storage (usually when you see huge buildings sitting off like this that's what they're for.)

It was a bit of a hike to walk from the parking lot to the visitor's center (or whatever you wanna call that front building where you sign in for your tour.)

Passing more barns on our way in. Maker's Mark is one of the older distillers of bourbon in the country, so it makes sense that they have a bunch of old-ass buildings spread throughout their grounds.

The Herb Garden (we'd be returning their within the hour.)

Standing in stark contrast to the rest of the grounds, which were rustic and historic, the interiors of some of these newer buildings were filled with vibrant and modern artwork. Like, pick a theme and stick with it, guys - this is a little too jarring for me.

Waiting to sign in for our tour.

This art installation was placed directly over the toilet in the Mens Room I frequented while we were waiting for our tour to kick off. Super trippy.

After we were checked in for our upcoming tour, we were led through a couple sitting rooms where the tour guide would soon collect us.

I'd be down with having a couch like this in my house, for sure.

Our tour wasn't set to begin until 10am, so we had, by this point in time, about ten minutes to kill. One of the perks of doing the Maker's Mark tour was that we were given a complimentary cocktail, so we all put our orders in to claim those while we waited. Here's Morgan, Mitch, and Ryan watching while the bartender puts together their drinks.

This bar was located in the rear sitting area, where the guide would soon be picking us up.

Awaiting drinks.

Some weird light fixture that was hanging from the ceiling. Personally, I could have used more cast iron and less modernness, but whatever - small gripe.

Slainte.

This was pretty damn good, and it looks like it would be pretty easy to make - gonna have to try it out sometime at home.

Setting off on our tour at 10am, we came down these steps from that building you see there.

We then proceeded down the hill that the visitor's center sat atop, past a bunch of old buildings (most of them dating back to the 1800s.)

Look, kids - another old barn.

The first spot the guide (at left) took us to was the original Herb Garden, where they grow ingredients to use in their bourbon. Some of us had some serious doubts that this small garden was sufficient enough to accommodate the amount of bourbon a distillery as renowned as this puts out. I'm sure they have a separate warehouse just for ingredients, and this small tour stop is just for show.

Some other piece of modern art, representing the original Husband and Wife owners of Maker's Mark (I forget their names, but you could google it if you were really curious.)

Other view of those garden gates I showed earlier, on our walk in.

Some high-tech gadgetry that measures rainfall and moisture and what else. Something fancy to do with plants, I'm told.

Leaving the garden, we turned left onto a paved walkway that snaked down another large hill. I paused and took this pic of the pathway headed in the opposite direction, back up the hill passed - you guessed it - more old barns.

The tour guide led us all the way down the hill towards a stream, where we were to check out a mushroom farm (or something along those lines - I wasn't really paying attention at this point of the tour.)

As far as monoliths go, I've definitely seen cooler ones.

Our tour guide, talking about. . . something.

We continued on, crossing a narrow footbridge that spanned a small stream through the woods.

The guide shows us the distillery's mushroom farm. Why a distillery needs mushrooms, I have no idea.

I'm told that mushrooms grow in these wooden contraptions, but I'm no mushroomologist.

Some amphitheater-ish stones that hugged the little clearing the mushroom 'farm' was in.

Coming back up the road. This building off to the left was a guardhouse (or gatehouse) that stopped incoming traffic before it continued on into the distillery grounds. I guess there used to be a bar that was lowered across the road at one point.

Farther down the road, another bridge.

We continued on up the road, where more and more buildings were clustered together.

Checking out more bizarre art installations (there's a lot of stuff like this spread over the Maker's Mark grounds. . .  personally, I could've done without it.)

Here you guys, check out this sweet, hard-to-read map.

The Kings of the Hill, enjoying their cocktails and tour.

This old carriage house stands along a narrow, old road that cuts through the distillery. Hundreds of years ago, so we're told, they used to keep jugs of whiskey in this little cabin, and when carriage drivers passed through, they'd stop at this little cabin, buy a jug off the salesman, then continue on. Kinda like an 18th century McDonald's, just with, you know, bourbon instead of overly-processed food.

Reproduction (I assume) of an old whiskey barrel cart.

Listening to the tour guide's ongoing spiel. He was pretty good, but some areas of the distillery were of far more interest than others (like, I could have spent more time checking out the historic buildings and less time on herb gardens and mushrooms.) 

(I think this was an on-property restaurant, but we never ducked in there to check it out.)

We had to wait five or so minutes, just kinda idly standing around, looking at stupid examples of 'modern art,' while we waited for the tour group ahead of us to vacate a particular building.

Moving forward on the tour.

Not sure what this was originally - a fire pit, a barbecue grill?

The ground was some kinda gravel/crushed glass mix - not something you see too often, it was weird. Not sure how folks avoid slicing the shit out of their shoes and sandals on these tours.

Inside one of the print rooms, where they still print the bottle labels on one of these old timey printing presses (that's been in operation for well over a hundred years.)

The last stop on our tour was checking out one of the barrel rooms (this one more for show than functionality - we'd been in far bigger warehouses that were stacked six times as high as what we saw here, but I think they show folks this one because of the artsy, stained glass ceiling.)

We had already gotten the whole 'barrel-aging and storing' lecture earlier in the weekend, so we already knew how all this worked. Still, you can't beat the smell of these warehouses - I could hang out in one of those all damn day.

Leaving the warehouse, we moved through an open door at the end of the halllway. . .

. . . and exited - of course - through the Gift Shop.

They had a lot of the usual merch here - bottles of hard-to-find whiskey, hats, clothing, bar accessories, home decor, glasses, etc.

I bought yet another bar mat for my basement bar (probably the coolest looking one I scored over the weekend), and considered that good enough. Some of the guys wanted to pay the $30 or whatever it was to hand-dip your own bottle of Maker's Mark like they do for all their bottles made at the factory.

Different varieties of Maker's Mark you could hand-dip. Morgan, Tom and Erik went with just a normal bottle of Maker's Mark, while Omkar opted for a smaller, higher-quality variety.

Erik and Morgan, ready to rock.

Morgan hand-dips his bottle of bourbon.

His turned out pretty awesome.

Erik takes a crack at it.

Erik didn't end up using as much wax as Morgan, so he didn't get as much drippage on his bottle.

The finished products.)

On the way to the car, we had another tourist hanging out there take a pic of all us dudes by this little, covered bridge. You know, for shits and giggles' sake.

Walking back up the hill towards the Visitor's Center (or whatever the hell they call it.)

So Google Maps took us a weird, random way in to Maker's Mark - a winding, one-lane path that zig-zagged down a hill, with a cliff falling off to one side. If another car had been coming from the opposite direction, we would've been hard-pressed to both fit on the road at the same time without falling off. Unfortunately for all of us, Google once again had us go down this white-knuckle ride on our way out. 

Our next stop was Woodford Reserve - like Maker's Mark, another highlight of the trip - located about an hour-drive away. 

Most of the Kentucky countryside that we passed through looked like either this. . .

. . . or this.

Pulling into Woodford Reserve. That building there is the Visitor's Center (welcome center, registration office, whatever) where we'd have to check in for our upcoming tour and scope out the merch.

After parking the van, we channeled our inner Reservoir Dogs on our walk up.

This distillery was on par with Maker's Mark and Four Roses as far as gift shops go - definitely more of a variety here compared to some of the smaller distilleries.

Scoping out the usual wares - clothing, hats, bottle of booze (some standard, others hard to find), different glasses and barware, culinary items made from bourbon, etc.)

They had a lot of great bourbon here, but so does our local Costco.

Like at the previous few distilleries, I only purchased a bar mat for my bar - not the greatest design (compared to some of the other I picked up this weekend) but decent enough to not pass up.

While some of us shopped, the others sat around in the waiting area for our scheduled distillery tour to start.

Collier, getting antsy for the tour.

Our tour guide gathered everyone on the porch area of the building and walked us through, briefly, the history of Woodford before leading us down a hill towards a series of barrel warehouses and distillery buildings.

This place wasn't spread out as much as Maker's Mark, so the tour didn't require as much walking (a good thing, considering it was hot as hell outside.)

Another shot of the building we started off at.

Every barrel you see in these pictures is filled with bourbon. The following pics will kinda walk you through the process, but eventually they roll out of these buildings and are pushed in a long line towards the warehouses where they're eventually aged.

Our first stop would be this distillery (or whatever you call it) where they actually mix up the ingredients and pour it into a barrel for aging. While the grounds weren't as scenic or historic as Maker's Mark, the tour was hands-down the most informative of the weekend. Our guide walked us through the process, step by step, from start to finish.  

Barrels slowly roll down away towards the warehouses.

Collier got a pic of me taking the previous pic. Lots of the other people's pics are included in all of these Brocation posts.

Upon entering the building, we immediately went up a flight of stairs to the second floor.

It was super hot up here, due in part to the summer heat outside, but also due to the fermentation process going on in those big casks you see scattered around.

These large vats contain what will eventually be bourbon. The different ingredients are piped in, and the bubbling mass of goop ferments (somehow, 'cause 'science') and turns into alcohol.

Mitch demonstrates how if you hold your hand right above the surface of the crap, you can feel the heat simmering off it.

Falling into one of these things would suck, 100%.

After hearing all about this stage of the process, the guide led us down another flight of stairs, and the temperature soared another twenty degrees - practically unbearable.

These giant, copper stills are where the magic happens. The previous vats are eventually piped down to this furnace-like room where its churned into bourbon (somehow.) This shit looks like something out of a Dwemer ruin in Skyrim.

Off to the side, you can make out the last vat where the finished product is emptied into one barrel at a time.

Group pic in front of the stills.

As each barrel is filled up, it automatically rolls away down this conveyor-ish thing and outside onto the grass (you saw earlier how the line of barrels slowly rolls up back towards the storage warehouses, where the barrels age.)

The amount of money that goes into each of these barrels is staggering.

Back outside - where it felt much cooler, despite being a hot, August afternoon in the South - our guide continued with his tour spiel, telling us more about the barrel aging process.

Warehouse windows.

This step of the process we had already gotten before (most notably at Jim Beam, the day before.)

Ka-ching.

This is how the barrels outside are loaded into the warehouse (each weighs a lot - I assume - so you have to have some way to lift it into the storage racks.)

We didn't hang out in this warehouse long, just a fraction of the time that we spent in Jim Beam.

Peaked through a window and took a pic of this. . . whatever's going on here, the guide didn't tell us.

More standing around and listening.

After the tour wrapped up, our guide walked us into this room for our scheduled tasting (always fun.)

Morgan, Mitch, Omkar, Erik, Collier, and Yours Truly at the end.

The Double was probably my favorite whiskey of the entire weekend. Pricey, but super good.

We left Woodford around 3:00pm, and doubled-back across the Kentucky countryside littered with sprawling horse farms.

About an hour later, we pulled into the last distillery of the day: Heaven Hill.

Some threatening storm clouds were rolling in, but we were only doing a tasting at this place (Morgan and Mitch waited until the last minute to book this one, so there were no available tours), so we'd be indoors for the entire time.

Some old-timey pickup truck parked out front of the main entrance (probably doesn't run anymore.)

Checking in with the Front Desk for our final tasting of the day.

Tom scopes out some of the limited edition bottles that were in some lit-up display case when you first walked in. Heaven Hill is an umbrella company that has many famous brands underneath it (Larceny, Weller, etc.) 

Some of us ducked into a nearby merch store - there's always a merch store - to shop around while we waited for our scheduled tasting to start. I once again picked up a bar mat  (a Larceny brand one this time) before walking over to the tasting room.

Outside the tasting room, our 'host' (for lack of better term) started telling us us about the different brands under the Heaven Hill banner, the history of the company, yada yada yada - more of the usual.

Once seated in the tasting room, the host would give us a run-down about the ingredients and aging process of each pour in front of us (something that every tasting session host did.) 

As always, you had something basic, something rye (spicy), something 'meh,' something strong, and something awesome.

Mitch, Ryan, Omkar and Morgan.

After the tasting, a couple of the guys wanted to pick up a few bottles, so Tom and I relaxed in some nice, leather chairs while they wrapped up.

About a half an hour later, we rolled back into our hotel to drop off some stuff, change, and prep for dinner.

This, for me, was the highlight of the trip, and the one thing I had been looking forward to the most: Talbot Tavern (which I discussed earlier.) While they don't house people in the historic rooms in the original building - now they're devoted to museum space - an adjoining building has rooms available for rent. We weren't staying there (obviously), but had a reservation in the original, 18th century dining room for dinner.

A neighboring Bed and Breakfast had some stocks that we made Collier and Tom pose in. You kinda have to do this whenever you see these, I'm pretty sure it's the law.

Historic Talbot Tavern.

We had arrived about a half an hour before our reservation, and therefore ducked into a 'bourbon bar' that had been built onto the main building about a century later.

The merch store that greets you upon entering the tavern. Back in the day this was probably some kind of a common room. You can see the check-in counter at the back of the room, at center.

I've never seen notices like this in Michigan bars and restaurants, but they're plastered up everywhere down here in Kentucky.

Throughout the tavern, you'd see framed signs like this one, detailing the building's 'colorful' history.

I finished my drink before the other guys had (they were all drinking whiskey, I just grabbed a beer), so I took the opportunity to explore the tavern a bit before we were seated at our table.

These steps go up to the second floor of the original building, where you can find the famous rooms for the original lodgers.

Eventually, we were seated at a long table at the back of one of the tavern's three dining rooms. There was a long line at the check-in counter this evening, so we had to wait a bit to even check in for our reservation, but the place was far from slammed - there were empty tables everywhere. We were told later that a few people had called in and they were short-staffed, which led to excruciatingly slow service throughout the evening.

Mitch, Morgan and I, perusing the menu.

After getting a round of waters, we had to wait like 20 minutes for our first round of drinks. We didn't blame the servers, though - they were literally running through the room to get orders, drop off food and drinks, etc. It must've been terrible for them.

I was getting antsy just sitting around waiting, so I got up to explore more of the tavern and take more pics. Here's another dining room, off to one of the sides.

Mounting the previously mentioned staircase to the second floor, I reached a landing that splintered off into multiple, christened bedrooms.

The third dining room, not even being used.

When I got back to the table, my drink had arrived - a Kentucky Mule (using bourbon instead of vodka.)

After our drinks were gone and we had put in our food order, we had to wait for another long stretch of time, and I went back upstairs to check out the different rooms. This one had been notoriously used by the James gang, hence the placard above the door.

The original wall murals are in pretty rough shape, but there were informational signs everywhere that explained what you were looking at.

The destruction of Pompeii.

An image showing the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius (which I've had the privilege of seeing before.)

Bullet holes in the wall - protected by sheets of glass - show how the James Gang vandalized the room after getting drunk and rowdy.

Back out on the landing, heading downstairs to the table.

Went with a chicken salad this evening - something light and not overly-fried (after drinking all day I never have much of an appetite.)

After dinner, most of the guys wandered out the front door to stand on the sidewalk and get some fresh air, but me and a couple others went back upstairs to check out more of the tavern.

(Lincoln stayed here, too.)

I opened up a door that led onto a balcony that overlooked the street below. There was a 'restricted' sign posted on the door - only guests staying at the tavern were allowed to utilize the balcony - but I said 'screw it.' I'll probably never come back to this place, I wanted to make the most of it.

The guys thought this was hilarious.

Crazy to think so many famous people have stood in that exact same spot over the last three hundred or so years.

Aaaaand a pic of me leaving the tavern, after much sight-seeing.

Setting off for the van, after a few hours soaking up bourbon and American History (a great combination, really.)

Back at the hotel, folks wandered up to their rooms to change into suits and grab some drinks for one, last poolside hangout session.

Some of us were too full from dinner to get into the water this evening, and were satisfied just sitting by the bluetooth speaker and knocking a few back.

Screwing around with the slo-mo feature on my phone's camera.

At 10pm, like the previous two nights, we had to call it quits as the pool area shut down (you can see the dude at the far left - he was pretty cool with us because we were polite and not like, you know, a bunch of rowdy 20-somethings drinking and being loud.) We decided to skip the usual late-night card games, as we had to get up early and begin the long trek home in the morning. Stay tuned for the thrilling conclusion, folks. . .

- Brian