“What’s in Kentucky?” Bourbon.

Outside of the 50-State Challenge, Kentucky was never on my “to-do” list until a few months ago. My boyfriend Eddie was a whisky drinker, so of course when we started dating, I became one too. A few months before our trip, I had an “a-ha” moment, realizing that all Kentucky bourbon is distilled in Kentucky (duh). In researching a couple of the bourbons we like to drink, not only did I find that most distilleries are in about a 2-hour circumference, but that there’s an actual “Kentucky Bourbon Trail” that you can follow to visit a number of distilleries. I bounced the idea of celebrating our anniversary in Kentucky to go bourbon tasting off of Eddie, and he thought it was a great idea.

Because our flight left out of San Diego at 7am and we didn’t want to worry about finding an Uber that early, we opted to stay at a hotel near the airport to not only allow ourselves to sleep in an extra hour, but to also get to rely on an airport shuttle to take us to our air limo. We stayed at The Bay Club Hotel and Marina on Shelter Island, and to our delight, found a “Happy Anniversary” card, along with some sparkling wine! I thought that was a nice, sweet touch.

Thursday – Travel and Arrival

The next day was mostly travel. We took the hotel shuttle to the airport, flew to Louisville, picked up our rental car, and then stopped at a small diner for dinner, where I tried some Kentucky cuisine: the “hot brown”. It was a slice of Texas toast, topped with turkey, ham, bacon, and liquid cheese. It tasted like breakfast. Eddie had fried chicken.

We stopped at Kroger to pick up some groceries for breakfast; the tiny house (cabin) I booked through AirBnB had kitchen appliances for us to be able to eat at “home” if we chose. We finished the trek and self-check-in’ed to our home away from home.

It was seriously adorable.

The tiny-house was hand-built by the host and had everything we needed; plumbing (the water got hot quick!), mini fridge, toaster oven, hot plates, DVD player, shower, AC/heating… In fact, the host had left the porch light on for us, as well as the heater going so the cabin would be warm by the time we arrived. We both loved the small space.

It wasn’t too late, so we ended up on the futon and watched Grumpier Old Men before turning in for the night.

Friday – Makers Mark

Thanks to jet-lag, we got up around 10am and started making breakfast. I brewed some Black Rifle Coffee we had brought with us and toasted a couple bagels while Eddie cooked up some bacon and eggs. While we were cooking, we happened to look outside to find we were being watched.

Eddie went out to play with them for a bit before we left, but they were such sweet dogs!

We headed south towards Loretto, where GPS took us some wonky country-back way, which neither of us really minded. I didn’t get many photos but just imagine country homes on acres of property. Beautiful.

We arrived at the Makers Mark distillery (our go-to bourbon) and signed up to take their tour. We already loved Maker’s bourbon, but after learning the history of the company and the process to make the different kinds of bourbon, we love the brand even more! Eddie said the property smelled like sourdough, but that’s not what I got. The smell, of course, was the corn, rye and wheat being turned into bourbon.

Of course, we bought a couple small bottles and dipped them in the trademark red wax ourselves! We’ll crack these open next year when we celebrate our second anniversary.

We shared a sandwich at the cafe on the property before heading to Four Roses, only to find that hey had just closed 30-minutes prior. So we went down to Cove Spring Park, which is a nature preserve not far from where we were staying with a stream and small waterfalls. I would have liked to hike/walk around a little longer but the park closed at dusk and it was getting dark.

We stopped for dinner in what seemed like the middle of nowhere, and I had the second dish I had wanted to try in Kentucky; the burgoo. It’s a strange name for a vegetable stew with pork and chicken in it with a side of cornbread. A super tasty dish that I might attempt to recreate one of these cold winter days.

Saturday – Bourbon Tour

The next morning, we got up a little earlier and I found that the steamboat cruise I had booked us for the night was canceled due to “severe” weather. When I booked the cruise, they said they run rain or shine and while yes, it was raining, it wasn’t what I’d call “severe”. I was kind of bummed, but it opened up the rest of the afternoon for us to fill with more distilleries.

So after breakfast, we returned to Four Roses for a tasting and browsed their gift store. We were surprised to learn that none of their bourbons were actually distilled on that property. We also learned that they were one of the handful of distilleries that were still operational during prohibition because of “medicinal” use.

We headed to Woodford Reserve next, since it wasn’t too far away, but were kind of crunched for time to engage in their tasting, which was across the street from where we had parked. So instead, we had lunch at their cafe and ordered a couple Old Fashioned whiskys in copper souvenir cups and relaxed on the couches they had in their lobby.

I don’t think I had ever heard of Buffalo Trace before this trip, but it was one Eddie mentioned a couple times, so we stopped by for their tasting next. They had a vodka in their tasting that made me react like that Michael Scott meme where he’s like, “nope. don’t like that!” We learned that the distillery was named Buffalo Trace because of the tracks that buffalo left in the area back in the day. We did end up walking around the distillery (unguided) just to take a look around the old brick buildings.

We made Bulleit our last stop of the trip and joined two other couples in the tasting room and learned that Bulleit is actually a pretty young company; having started in the late 80’s. Bulleit’s tasting was different from all the rest, in that they also provided some scented wood chips to go with each bourbon, ranging from spicy to floral, which changed the taste the bourbon left on your tongue when you smelled the chips after tasting.

That was pretty much the end of our trip. We returned to the cabin after dinner and started packing everything back up to return home the next day.

I enjoyed being able to get away for the weekend with the boyfriend and celebrate our recent trip around the sun. It was kind of like a 3-day long date! Knowing how set and happy I was traveling on my own, it was nice to discover that Eddie and I travel well together too. So I’m looking forward to more travel and adventure with him in the future. Maybe even on my next passport trip!