Travel: Train from Inverness to Muir of Ord (30 mins) / Walk from Station to distillery (10 mins)
Directions: It was a short train ride from Inverness to Muir of Ord, then from the station it is only a short walk to the distillery. I went over the footbridge and then headed straight towards the road before taking a slight right and then it was a straight walk all the way to the distillery which was on the left.
At the Distillery
The visitor centre was refurbished in 2022 and it looks excellent with a large shop and café on site where you can enjoy a light snack or dram before or after the tour and pick up a bottle afterwards if you wish. There is a decent sized shop with a wide selection of Singleton drams and other Diageo drams, some of which I had not heard of before. There is also the option to bottle your own 11yr old cask strength Singleton if you wish.
My Tour (The Classic Tour)
The tour began in the visitor centre in a small alcove between the shop and café, I had chosen the standrad tour at 11:30 which lasts for just over an hour and gives you a tour of the production process and three drams afterwards. The Glen Ord Singleton is one of three malts in the Singleton range, the other two being located in Dufftown and Glendullan. According to my guide, each singleton expression targets a different international market with the Glen Ord focused on the Asian market, Dufftown on Europe and Glendullan on North America. The whiskies have different flavour profiles which are targeted at these individual markets, this also means that I can be difficult to buy some of the Singletons in the UK, as the Glen Ord for example is mostly exported to Asia.
The distillery has a high volume of whisky being produced each year with around 14 million bottles per year which might be surprising if you have never heard of the Glen Ord singleton. The tour gives you a glimpse of the scale of production, one of the first rooms on the tour is where a 8 wooden washback’s which each hold around 56,000 litres of whisky gold. I had the chance to see the fermentation in action and you could see through the window the hot water being sprayed over the malt.
The next room was the Spirt stills and there were 6 which you could view, along with two spirt stills for the low wines and for the whisky. These rooms offer a decent gauge of the production levels but there are other areas with more washback’s and stills which you don’t get too see. The penultimate stop is a traditional dunnage warehouse, although all of the whisky is not stored in this area as they are unable to expand to meet their production amounts so other sites in Leven and Striling hold the excess production. You do get to see the two main casks of American Oak and Sherry buts and have a smell of the casks, where you get a hit of the wonderful flavours which are developing inside.
The Tasting
The tasting is conducted in a tasting room which is close to where the tour starts in the visitors centre and you get to taste three whisky’s all of which are from the Singelton range. This included a 12 year old Dufftown, 15yr old Glendullan and distillery exclusive Glen Ord. My favourite dram was probably the Glen Ord, it had a strange almost transparent colour with hints of raisins and apples on the palate it was unusual and very drinkable. However as a side note I did get to try the Glen Ord 12 in the shop afterwards and it was outstanding, they are missing a trick not letting you try that on that tour.
Free Time: If you have some free time there not much in Muir of Ord, but you can get a coffee to cake at a café in town near the train stations or there is a decent size Coop where you can get snacks. However, another option is to stay at the café in Glen Ord as there are some light snacks and a good selection of whisky and it is a perfect area for chilling out for a while.