Orkney and Thurso Trip: Day 2 (Old Pulteney & Wolfburn)

Itinerary

09:20 – 09:58 Bus (Stagecoach X99: Inverness): Thurso (Sir George’s Street)  – Wick (Agnes St)
10:00 – 10:10 Walk: Agnes St – Old Pulteney Distillery
10:30 – 11:30: Tour: A taste of Old Pulteney Tour
12:00 – 12:15: Walk: Distillery – Train Station
12:34 – 13:02: Train (ScotRail: Inverness): Wick – Thurso
13:05 – 13:30: Walk: Train Station – Wolfsburn Distillery
14:00 – 15:30 Tour: Wolfburn Classic Tour
15:30 – 16:00 Walk: Premier Inn Thurso (Overnight)

Note: I got a bus from Thurso to Wick as it worked out slightly better to match with my tour times, but it is also possible to get a train through, and for a cost savings point, it would be better to either get a bus or train return ticket. The obvious benefit of the train is that it is a far shorter trip.

Journey to Old Pulteney

I took the X99 Inverness bus through to Wick today on a slightly rainy Friday morning. I caught the bus at Sir George’s Street Church, which is just off the high street, past the Royal Hotel and opposite side of the road from the local nightclub. The best stop for Old Pulteney is Agness Street in Wick, which is two stops after the Bus Terminal. From that stop, it is only around a 10-minute walk to the distillery via a bit of a zig-zag route. I walked back the way the bus travelled and then took a right, and walked along the footpath parallel to the football field. At the end of the path, there is a wall and a sign pointing left to Old Pulteney, so I headed left and then took a quick right and at the end of that road was the distillery building, where the visitors centre was on the left-hand side. The building looks like an old house, and you have to give the door a solid push to open it (I originally thought it was locked, as it is a very heavy door!).

Facilities at Old Pulteney

The facilities at Old Pulteney are limited to the shop, which you enter on arrival, and a tasting room through a corridor at the back of the building. The tasting room does have some history, as it used to be the old cooperage. There are no food or drink options on site.

Tour

I joined the standard tour, which, although it was advertised on the website as being 90 minutes long it was actually pretty much bang on 60 minutes in duration. The tour begins in the tasting room with a short history of Old Pulteney, where next year, the distillery will celebrate its 200th anniversary, so it is one of the older distilleries in Scotland. The tour covers the usual production sites, but there are a few unique details that make Old Pulteney stand out. The mash tun, for example, is topped with a distinctive copper lid, something you don’t often see, and you also get to walk above the mash tun as you access the next rooms, so you get a unique viewpoint of the structure. At Old Puletney they run four wash cycles instead of the standard three, which wasn’t explained during the tour, but I can only assume it’s a way of squeezing out every last bit of sugar from the wort. Sustainability appears to be a big focus here: instead of sending their distillation by-products off as cattle feed, Old Pulteney uses the waste for biomass energy, and 90% of the energy used to power the distillery comes from an on-site biomass plant, which runs on woodchips.

The stills are some of the most striking I’ve seen, while all distilleries have various unique still shapes, Old Pulteney’s are particularly interesting for the very pronounced bow shape in the middle (mirrored in the design of their bottles), and the top of the wash still looks almost as if it’s been chopped off. The warehouses were also quite impressive in size. First, we paid a visit to a traditional dunnage warehouse, which initially did not look significant, but when you explore more into the building, and look down one of the long corridors and then appreciate the size of the warehouse. The second warehouse was a racked layout, and it was even more impressive: with barrels stacked nine high to the ceiling, a wall of oak and whisky with incredible aromas hanging in the air.

Tasting

The tasting usually takes place in a large room at the back of the shop, but as there was another tour starting, we had the tasting in a “VIP” room, which is just off the main room. The Old Pulteney whisky is one of the first single malts that I ever tried when I was first getting into whisky, so my expectations were high for this tasting. I remembered this whisky being very sweet, and that is one of the main flavour profiles I found for both drams. The tasting included the 12-year-old and the Mariner unaged expressions of Old Pulteney. The main flavours which came through the drams for me were honey and oak, and both drams were quite similar, although I would say that the harbour was slightly better. Despite being a little younger and cheaper, it had a smoother and cleaner finish than the 12-year-old. One minor negative was that the samples were a bit on the small side, which meant, a couple of sips and it was done!

Trip back to Thurso

I opted to take the train back to Thurso just to save time, really, as I had another tour in the afternoon at Wolfburn. The train station is 15 minutes from the distillery, so still very accessible. To get there, walk out of the distillery and take a right, then continue along Huddart St until you come to Grant St where you take a left and walk straight for around 10 mins until the crossroads and then take a right and the station will be on your left. The train journey is quite short, as it is only two stops until Thurso on the Inverness train.

Travel to Wolfburn

I also visited Wolfburn today, which sits just outside Thurso. To get there, I started on the main high street, headed towards the Bank of Scotland, and then followed the road uphill for about 20 minutes. There’s a footpath the whole way, with some lovely views opening up on the right-hand side. Eventually, the footpath ends on the right, so you cross the road to pick up the path on the left, and then you’ll soon spot a sign for the walk to Wolfburn. Just beyond that sign, a paved path winds through a small patch of trees and leads into an industrial estate. In there, you’ll pass a BT building on your left; look out for the Wolfburn sign just beside it. Follow the sign, and you’ll find the distillery tucked in behind the BT office block.

At Wolfburn

The distillery is quite a modest operation, so there is not much in the way of facilities available on site, as pretty much everything is in the same building. There is a small shop space as you enter the building, where you can buy some whisky or souvenirs, and there is a pour-your-own bottle available.

Tour

The tour is interesting as you can see all of the equipment from the shop when you enter, so it’s a fairly compact tour; everything from the Mill to the Still is in the same room, so you work from left to right. The production here is on a very modest scale, as they only produce around 125,000 litres of spirit per year, and this is reflected in the equipment.  The mash tun might be one of the smallest I have seen, and there are only a couple of aluminium washbacks and a couple of stills where the spirit is produced. This is quite a new distillery as they only started producing spirit just over 12 years ago, and their first 12-year-old single malt was just released the month before I arrived. The only part of the tour not in the main building are the warehouses, and you get to visit an old-fashioned dunnage-style warehouse and see some of the casks being used at Wolfburn.

The end of the tour is in the main building where you get a generous tasting of 6 different expressions of Wolfburn, which cover almost every type of Wolfburn which they had on offer in the shop (you can try the other two at the end of the tour if you ask nicely!). As there is no tasting room, you stand just next to the shop area and go through each whisky. The whisky here is a mix of peated and unpeated spirit, but the peated options are very mild at around 10ppm. They had bourbon and sherry variations on the tasting and a mix of non-age statement along with a 10 and 12-year-old, which I imagine will become their core range. The whisky here is pretty decent, a bit of a fruity flavour and along with some that had a light peaty finish, The two best for me were the 10 year old which was finished in an oloroso cask which brought out sweet and fruity flavours and then my favourite was the Morven which is a non-aged statement but around 8 years old and although it was peated as it was only 10ppm it was just a hint of peat which did not overpower the flavour of the dram. 

Overnight (Day 2)

On my second night in Thurso, I decided to be a bit more organised and book a table for dinner, since it was a Friday and the night before had been surprisingly busy. I booked a table at the Y Not Bar & Grill, which from the outside looked more like a nightclub than a restaurant, but inside it turned out to be a lively and welcoming place. The service was good, and I was glad I’d booked as it was fully reserved for the evening and seemed to have a mix of locals and tourists, which is always a good sign. I ordered the Highland Burger, which was a mix of haggis and meat, and thought it tasted pretty good.

Afterwards, I explored a couple of local bars. My first stop was the Royal Thurso Hotel, which I had been curious about after noticing its rather poor TripAdvisor ratings when searching for accommodation. That might explain why it was so quiet when I walked in; there was a 2:1 ratio of staff to customers. The interior was fairly plain, but the staff were friendly and I enjoyed a decent pint of Innis & Gunn. That said, with a few too many flies buzzing around, I don’t think I’d eat there, and while I wouldn’t pile onto the negative reviews, I also wouldn’t rush back.

I rounded off the evening at Top Joes, a sports bar that was packed, so much so that I could not even get a seat. I’d just been looking for somewhere to watch the football, and for that purpose it did the job perfectly.