Kentucky Bourbon Trail - Day 3 Castle & Key, Woodford, and a Surprise Side Trip

We started early with the first tasting of the day at Castle & Key. This place is great. The setting and scenery are beautiful, and the building is historic and interesting. Aaron was our tasting guide and he did a very nice job. The group with us was pretty fun and although the tasting was early, some of them may have pre-flighted. Bobby was entertaining as well in his search for unique tasting notes, none of which were really there, not even the corn silk. After the tasting we headed to the gift shop – all tours and tastings end at gift shops – where we made a couple purchases and then headed to the bar. This tasting included some stairs to get to the historic tasting room so could be tricky for those with mobility challenges.

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The bar is in a separate building – I had a nice Old Fashioned and Jayne fell in love with the Kentucky Bloody, a Bloody Mary with bourbon. When I say fell in love, she even threatened to throw away all vodka and tequila when we got home…she did not, but she hasn’t touched the stuff. As some point during the weekend, Jayne also made the earth-shattering statement that she likes rye. Hmm, that may cost me some money in the future.

Anyway, Castle & Key’s outdoor activities are in a beer garden type- setting with shaded seating and a small river and waterfall.

This was the best outdoor area of all the distilleries we visited, and of course Bobby made friends with some random people.

Those random people ended up being very cool; a former Marine turned police sniper, and his former Navy ER doctor turned professor. Bobby being a retired cop himself, and Lore a retired Navy nurse, the connection was immediate and we hung out with them for a good while. They told us we needed to visit another nearby distillery called Larrikin. They mentioned the owners’ backgrounds which piqued our interest, so we figured we would fit it in if we could.

We next headed to a schedule tour at Woodford Reserve. Tours start at a central, kind of registration area and a short bus ride to the distiller across the street. Bobby met more people at the sign in, members of the Pipes & Drums of California Professional Firefighters. Nice people on a long road trip who gave us a couple stickers for the pub.

The tour here was comprehensive, including the barrel room, fermentation tanks, the historic triple pot copper stills, and a very large, very old rickhouse. There is a bit of walking and on and off the bus on this tour, so a little challenging and very doable for most everyone.

This tour also ended with a tasting which we all enjoyed…and Bobby continued his search for unique notes.

We again ended up in the gift shop and came home with more bottles, so just a couple additions to extend the collection that was building in the car. While there, we met a couple guys in line, and they gave us the same advice about Larrikin. Two tips about the same place which happened to be pretty close, and with nothing us planned, off we went to the Larrakin Bourbon Company.

Larrakin is another must-see place. It feels more like a craft brewery than distillery, but the owners are awesome people with a great story.

Greg Keeley is a former was in the Royal Australian Navy, Special Boat Service, before joining the U.S. Navy and retiring as a Lieutenant Commander. His wife, Katie, is a former U.S. Navy nurse. Both of them were beyond awesome to talk with, and if you can get some sea stories from Greg, do it. I enjoyed their whiskey, at least what I remember of it since this was now our third tasting of the day, not to mention a couple visits to the distilleries’ bars after tastings. Don’t worry, we were safe, but Jayne did take over driving duties.

We headed back to the VRBO to freshen up and then headed across the street to Last Stop Brewing for dinner and some Notre Dame football. The night’s menu included wings which were fantastic and our serve, Chelsea, was great. We were all pretty tired from the last three days, so we headed back to the very comfortable VRBO to watch the rest of the game and, surprise, have a nightcap. We weren’t sure what Day 4 had in store. Sadly, Bobby and Lore would be returning home, and we had not planned for many distilleries to be closed on Labor Day. Jayne and I were certain we would figure out some way to have fun. I had no idea what surprise was in store.