Well, I drove down to Kentucky last month from New Jersey. Beautiful ride, especially through West Virginia. I work for a family owned three store chain; our largest store is 24k square feet. The manufacturer's reps booked me in Lexington for a few days. Another rep booked me in Louisville for another few days and my employer paid my travel expenses.....life is good. I visited eight distilleries and was sipping white dog right out of the still at Buffalo Trace.
Everyone gave me the VIP treatment and I picked up a lot of goodies from each distillery including signed bottles, tasting glasses and polos. Al Young of Four Roses also gave me a signed copy of his book on the history of the distillery. Ate some good BBQ and every bar/restaurant I was in had a complete compliment of Pappy.
I was surprised at how small Woodford is. Very quaint and bucolic setting. They only use one aging warehouse that's only about 5-6 stories high. Most of the buildings are over 100 years old and constructed of local limestone.
Buffalo Trace is huge. They opened a nice BBQ place in the old firehouse. Great pulled pork and a local root beer.
Four Roses is another quaint setting with Spanish architecture.
At all the distilleries, I was told to wait until the tourists left the tasting rooms and they would always break out some special spirit for me.
Some pics at
http://www.priveye.com/bourbon/bourbon3 ... rbon3a.htm
and
http://www.priveye.com/bourbon/bourbon3 ... urbon4.htm
Roscoe