Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
laughing and at their worst still make you laugh, even if they do seem to be part of some
bizarre care-in-the-community light-industrial outsourcing programme. I'm sure I've en-
countered somebody on a tour or behind the counter in a Visitor Centre who was just
plain boring and uninterested, but obviously I've succeeded in forgetting about them.
One of the plusses of going round lots of distilleries is meeting up with people who
know each other, or are related to each other. It is a small industry; less than a hundred
distilleries, each one often only employing a dozen people in the actual physical process
and usually fewer than that in the onsite office. The skills involved are very transferable
within the industry as a whole, and because a lot of the distilleries are owned by larger
concerns, people are able to move round within that company's sites and see how it's
done elsewhere. I lost count of the number of times I bumped into somebody's mum, dad,
son, daughter, brother or whatever, once I'd told them that I had been to all these other
distilleries. 'Och, you'll have talked to so-and-so …'
Come to think of it, when you're a writer, especially one who's managing to keep the
wolf from the door, there aren't many professions you encounter which make you think,
Hmm, actually this must be quite a decent job. I wouldn't mind doing this … but working
in a distillery is arguably one of them. That's not to suggest that it must all be sweetness
and light incessantly, or that in the end you don't have bosses, who may well be as stu-
pid and/or as malicious as bosses everywhere can be, or that your job isn't subject to the
vagaries and volatilities of the market and the changing tastes of the international public,
but given that most of this applies to most jobs, it could be argued that working in a relat-
ively safe environment in some of the finest scenery in one of the world's more beautiful
countries while helping to make something to be proud of, within a tradition stretching
back hundreds of years, can be quite rewarding.
Put it this way; I never did meet anybody who couldn't wait to get out of the industry
and away. I'm sure they have existed, but maybe they've all already left to become fash-
ion photographers or skateboard wizards or party planners to the superrich or far-eastern
golf-course designers or something.
Wandering round Cardhu distillery - heart of Johnnie Walker, Scottish larch wash-
backs rather than the more usual Oregon pine - watching some ducks silently preening
themselves on the neatly clipped grass by the side of the gently steaming pond where the
cooling water goes to relax, looking round the smart, cream-coloured buildings, listening
to the quiet hissings and distant creaking noises of the place, surrounded by sloped fields
and lines of budding trees, a pleasant glow manifesting itself after a modest tasting - Les
was driving - Speyside suddenly seemed like one of the best places in the whole damn
world.
Stand-out distilleries? Architecture first. The Tormore is my favourite. Bit old fash-
ioned, given that it was built in 1958, but fabulously dramatic; fountains, manicured
