Not doing a lot of work on bowtie6 this weekend since the Mrs and I decided to take a little road trip along the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.  Since I am a fan of good bourbon I thought this would be a great opportunity to learn more about it.. What a trip this has been!!

We won’t have a chance to stop by all the distilleries along the way, but we did take the time to check out some of the ones I really like.  We started at Maker’s Mark – a smaller operation but nevertheless very impressive.  Actually had a chance to see where “46” is made – if you haven’t had a chance to try it, do yourself a favour and get some.  In the gift shop there, they had quite a nice selection and among the items not available except at the shop:  the Maker’s Mark Mint Julep had been highly recommended.  They also had “white dog” (the spirit before being aged) for sale in clear bottles.  We had a taste at the tasting station and it was extremely good – I reckon this will burn with a blue flame and indeed it had plenty of “bubbles”.  Yes, this was good “moonshine”.

Next on the list of visits was the Jim Beam distillery.  This was a much larger scale facility and in addition to Jim Beam, they make smaller production batches of among other things, Knob Creek.  Since they don’t rotate the barrels in their warehouses, the “good stuff” is found towards the middle to top of the racks of the warehouses.  And by good stuff, they are not joking! In those select racks they choose the barrels that will become such items as Knob Creek Single Barrel (unique to the gift shop), Basil Hayden, Baker’s and Booker’s.  We had a chance to taste Booker’s and that stuff is amazing:  it is 129 proof!!

Well needless to say, when on such trips one never knows what one might see.  At Maker’s Mark I spotted a fellow with a shirt with the Automobile Magazine logo embroidered on it…  Well, in the parking lot was this:

I have seen this bad boy in several magazines and indeed this is the new Mini Cooper coupe.  It is strictly a two seater.  As it turns out, the fellow with the Automobile Magazine shirt is one of the web editors, and of course I had to start a conversation!  This thing would be some serious fun.  He said it was quick indeed and it performed as good as it looks.  Here are some more shots…

That is a wing on the roof and it is trick!

So, if you are reading this post Mr Automobile Magazine Web Editor, it sure was nice chatting with you today!