The majority of this review will focus on the tour the distillery does but a few bits of information first.

The Aberlour distillery lies within the village of Aberlour in the speyside region of Scotland. It is part of what is sometimes known as the 7 stills of the seven hills area that includes other well know whiskey distillers such Balevine and Glenfidich. In fact no fewer than half of Scotland's malt distilleries are located in Speyside.


The Aberlour distillery is now part of the Chivas group.

history of the distillery-"The distillery was founded in 1879 by James Fleming, who shrewdly built it on the site of St Drostan's thus securing forever this priceless source of pure spring water"

As in common with a lot of the distillers you can book a tour. But this is the tour to end all tours and if you are a fan of single malt I would encourage you to do this one


The tour is structured in the following way-

*Its is small, intimate tour (maximum 16 people) this is to allow you see and hear everything clearly. The tour we did in the middle of the whisky festival had 12 people on it and this was great as the guide was able to check you all were able to see into the fermenting bins the gauges etc.

*Nosing and tasting in Warehouse No.1 of five mature Aberlour malts and a new-make spirit. You get to try the whiskey at the various stages in the process from the raw spirit which is the old fashioned "moonshine" which is very strong and will make not only your eyes water but your throat burn! You get to taste some of the various malts including the 10 year old 16 year old and the a'bunadh which is a natural single cask strength malt whisky unique to Aberlour. This is taken directly from specially selected sherry casks it is bottled as simply as possible without the use of modern filtering methods or the addition of water. they also give you two whiskeys to sample from the different styles of casks that the whiskey matures in.

* The chance to hand-fill and purchase your own personalised bottle of the single cask selection. This is exclusive to visitors on the distillery tour.
Only one person did this on our tour which i think was down to the £50 for the bottle but whiskey aficionados and whiskey collectors love this stuff and My uncle who has previously done this tour did this and its still proudly un-opened with our rare whisky!

* An audio-visual presentation on the history and production of Aberlour whisky precedes the guided tour. The main reason i think they do this is that some of the whisky process no longer happens on site ie the Malting process but all the rest happens at the site. The rest of the process is what makes each whiskey unique really the different water in the case of Aberlour The pure spring water for making the whisky is drawn from the Lour, and the maturing spirit in the warehouse beneficially inhales the moist Speyside air.

* Average time of visit is 1 hour 45 minutes. It has to be said ours lasted over this time and they were not trying to rush you out.

* Now as you are sample 5 whiskey I would make sure one of your party is a designated driver or that you stay in Aberlour as the measures are generous and my husband after having his and sweeping up mine as I was the drive was well tiddly on very good whiskey.

* there is a shop where you can buy the whisky and they seemed to be doing a great trade with most people buying at least one bottle after the end of the tour but don't expect it to be any cheaper there than in the supermarket is my advice.