Scotland/England '22: Day 2

St. Andrews to Speyside

Scotland/England '22 Gallery

Brain rewiring - stick shift on th left side!

After a nice sleep in Edinburgh, the fun begins. The goal today was getting up to Speyside to visit some distilleries. The ride isn’t really that far so a couple stops on the way to see some old castles. As is common in Scotland, many of the ’ruins’ aren’t so much from age and neglect as much as purposely destroyed by the English with a ‘If we can’t have it, then you can’t either’ mentality. A common story during the Jacobite Rebellion.

Scottish Golf Champion from the 1800s - note to self, remember to capture the headstone info if planning to post in a blog.

Sorry to the golfers, we didn’t visit the famous course in St. Andrews, so no photos.

We walked around what’s left of the Cathedral and Castle for a short visit before heading to Donnottar Castle in Stonehaven (not too far from Aberdeen). Unlike the many ‘ruins’ related to the Jacobite Rebellion, these ruins are related to the Reformation in Scotland. Remains of the Donnottar Castle were excellent. Lots of steps but beautiful lawn areas to simply sit and relax (at least on a warm day like today without the 80 mph winds). While Dufftown and Keith are the popular hubs for distillery touring, we decided on Rothes. So far so good. It’s a cute little town, and not too far from many of the big names like Macallan, Glen Fiddich as well as many others, see below:

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View from the grounds of Donnator Castle. See the gallery for more photos.

Speyside: Whisky, Whisky, Whisky

We’re now in the whisky promised land here in Speyside. Duh, maybe we should have booked some tours before arriving because a lot are already full. Not to worry, there are so many distilleries that we’ve lined up some action at the last minute, and to be honest, the big tours at places like Macallan are so-so anyway. We did the Jameson tour in Dublin in 2018 and it was fun and all, but not as cool as the smaller places. Oban was a great tour, as was Benromach (near Inverness). These are more like going to small wineries at home. Seriously, there are so many distilleries here. Just do a search on whisky distilleries in Speyside and see what you get!

Whisky Scoreboard:

• Glenfarclas 15 - thumbs up, kind of spicy