114. Virginia Whiskies and a Blue Ridge Weekend

We're a couple miles from the Blue Ridge Parkway, a mile from the Appalachian Trail. So, a lot of people congregate here to get away.

So, if I come up here and I hear banjo music... It's a good thing here. It's a good thing? Yeah. Okay.

When the banjo stops, that's when there's a problem.

Welcome to another trip down the Bourbon Road with your hosts, Jim and Mike. So grab a glass of your favorite bourbon and kick back.

We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Log Heads Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Find out more about their fine rustic furniture at logheadshomecenter.com. We would like to thank our friends at Premium Bar Products for sponsoring this episode. If you're ready to step up your game at your home bar, check out premiumbarproducts.com to choose from their wide selection of glassware, all of which can be custom engraved with your personal message or logo. And there's no minimum order. So after the episode, head over to premiumbarproducts.com and check out everything they have to offer. Now let's get on with the show. Hello everybody, this is Jim Shannon and I am without Mike today on the road in Virginia. Missing Mike, but Mike is leading a well or tasting this weekend in Shelbyville, Kentucky. I wish him all the luck on that. But I'm in Virginia. I'm in Montebello, Virginia with our old host, Randy Menick. Randy, welcome to the show. Well, thank you for having me on. Welcome to Virginia. Yeah, it's nice of you to invite us into your home. And for the past couple of days, we've been experiencing all things Blue Ridge Mountains on the backs of ATVs, walking the trails, climbing steps up, just seeing it all. It's been a real blast to be out here with you guys and sitting by the fire and eating hot dogs. That was good too. There you go.

You know, West Virginia people say almost heaven and those of us over here in Virginia say just come a little further east and you will be in heaven.

As Blake Shelton says, this is God's country.

It is God's country, and there are more, I guess, hardwood trees in the Shenandoah Valley than anywhere else in the country, so the falls here are absolutely gorgeous. You came just after peak season, but glad you're here. Virginia, this part of Virginia is no more for their cideries, for the orchards and apple cider and whatnot, but they do some bourbon in Virginia, believe it or not.

I think the rest of the world kind of knows they do bourbon over here, but they don't get a lot of attention. So today we're doing Virginia whiskeys and you brought a Virginia bourbon that we're going to have in the first half. This is true. What'd you bring for us?

So it's called Bear Knuckles. And I happen to see Bear Knuckles from KNO Distillery. KNO is out of Manassas, Virginia. Manassas. Now that's about 20 minutes south of DC, right? Well, remember the first battle of Manassas or Bull Run, people came out of DC to actually watch the battle during the Civil War. So it's not far. KNO Distillery was started by Carlson and Amara. And these guys here, I guess they met, from what I can understand, at the Merchant Marine Academy, and had been friends ever since. And Omar there, from what I can understand, actually graduated from the, what do they call that over there? Moonshine University.

Oh, in Louisville, Kentucky.

In Louisville, Kentucky. So there's your connection there between Virginia and Kentucky.

Now, Moonshine University has trained a lot of distillers, no doubt about it.

So, he graduated in 2013 and I guess they have been distilling. Well, this distillery actually opened up, I think broke ground in 2015 and have been doing it ever since. I actually saw somebody from K&O distillery talking about bare knuckle on a program that had to do with law. you know, and, and, and jurisdiction of distilled spirits in Virginia.

All right. Well, before we disclose the, the proof and the mash bill and all those things, why don't we go ahead and get straight to the whiskey? Like we like to do here. And we'll do that blind to the specs. How's that? We just know that this is a straight bourbon, right? It is a straight Virginia bourbon. Yes. All right. Cheers. Cheers. Okay, it's got a little bit of youth to it, but it's not like an extremely young bourbon. It's just sort of an adolescent.

So, these are supposed to be at least two years, right? To be straight. This one here says 37 months. So, just over three years. Okay. So, they're pushing that four-year point. They are. And you know, perhaps it was something they tried and they're released a little bit early because it's actually, I think it's actually not bad.

Okay, so I'm getting a pretty nice nose on it, youth aside. I am getting that corny sweetness that you would expect, and we'll find out about the mash bill later. But I'm also getting a nice little bit of spiciness, not too much, which is kind of interesting because the mash bill on this is 70% corn.

20% wheat and 10% malted barley.

So the spice I'm getting on the nose is not from the rye, but it's from the barrel. There you go. Well, you get the same thing sometimes with like a weller or another weeded whiskey. You can get fooled by it sometimes. That sweetness comes off on a little bit of caramel. The vanilla is prevalent, I think, on it. It doesn't have like an amazing nose on it. It's just got sort of an average bourbon nose, I would say. Let's take a sip. All right. That's sweet. And, and I'm getting that spiciness on this. All right. There's no rye here, but it's a little spicy.

It is, which is interesting, but it's, it's not too bad. Finish probably is a little more, but as it ages, I don't think that finish is going to be quite as good. It's a little nutty though for me. Almost like peanut. Yeah. Peanut brittle. Yeah. Yeah. Perfect. Peanut brittle. Peanut brittle. But, you know, Virginia has a nice, wonderful, clean water source, you know, in some good places and good water source. You know, it doesn't have the limestone to filter the water per se, but, you know, and a good place to grow some good grains. So it doesn't surprise me that Virginia probably has some pretty good bourbons here.

Now, that's got a bit of hug to it. I'm surprised.

Well, I don't know. Sometimes I expect that of a young one, more of a hug than the smoothness of something that's been aged.

Now, do we know, is this a column-stealed or a pot-stealed whiskey? I don't know that. Don't know.

Okay. I don't know. I'd have to try to do some more research on them. But I just happened to see them mentioned on the program. They were talking about here in Virginia. You only can get your hard liquors from a Virginia ABC store.

So for people who don't know what an ABC store is or what a controlled state is.

Right. Can you sort of what's it like living here? OK, so I first thing I had to do was go when you're used to Kentucky and going into any Ma and Pa place and getting, you know, somebody saving you something or whatever, even a big liquor bar and like they're in Middletown, you know, outside of Louisville. A lot of choices. not so much in a Virginia ABC. So, ABC from what I... You know, I had to go look it up. See, it's Alcoholic Beverage Control Authority is what that stands for. So, from what I understand is we know that prohibition was brought in with the 18th Amendment and the 25th Amendment is the one that took prohibition out and the second section of that actually gave control to the states to regulate

You know, so each of the states at that point has the opportunity to set their own rules regarding how to control liquor in the state.

And it's usually set up in a three tier system. So you have your distiller. you have your distributor, and then you have your retailer that sells it. So the Virginia ABC takes care of those second and third steps.

So they're the distributor and the retailer. They corner the market. Basically. But it's done for the good of Virginia citizens. Oh, doesn't the government always do it for the good of the citizens?

You can't control yourself. We're going to help you. But you were in one. Yeah. Virginia ABC. You know, we do have some, some choices for bourbons here in Kentucky.

So you walk into the ABC store here and it's, you know, there's not a lot of marketing going on or anything in there, but you come into the store and it's not all that different from any other, uh, bottle shop that you would go into. I mean, they've got, they've got a good selection of bourbons. They had two good long shelves here, bourbons, uh, and a large number of the top shelf. I think they're promoting their own stuff. All the Virginia bourbons were on the top shelf. Right. How about that? Whether they were priced that way or not. Whether they're priced that way or not. So there were probably eight to 10 Virginia bourbons in all? Yeah, most of them were whiskeys. Oh, let's not say, yeah. Whiskeys. Just whiskeys. Rye's, American whiskeys, and bourbon. Right. Yeah.

And so I just wanted to try this one just because, you know, let's see what it's all about. You know, most people have heard of Bowman, but even though Bowman, the name Bowman is, you know... Famous here in Virginia, I guess you could say. There's some other things going on with Bowman that a lot of people don't know, but you could probably tell.

Bowman and people around across the country are familiar with Bowman whiskey. Many people know that that whiskey does not originate at Bowman. Right. Yeah, it's sourced whiskey. In fact, it's coming out of Kentucky. Yeah. We won't talk too much about that because we're here today to talk about whiskies that are actually distilled and bottled in the state of Virginia, and that are also available outside the state of the Virginia. And it's not just bourbons, but it rises. And I would say in Virginia, there seems to be a bit more rye than bourbon. Yes.

So, when I was actually going, okay, what's the connection with Virginia and Kentucky? Most people understand that the western part of Pennsylvania was all in arrears when the whiskey rebellion came around and Alexander Hamilton said, you know, to pay for the Revolutionary War, we were going to tax whiskey, you know, we're going to tax spirits. And I think it was about nine cents a gallon. That's a lot back in those days, you know. So, they were all in arrears. The whiskey rebellion gets put down and a lot of them come down to Kentucky. But what a lot of people don't realize is that those who fought in the Virginia militia in the Revolutionary War were given tracks and land in what is now Kentucky. So they're given these tracks and land and they go there and they end. So, you know, George Washington was known for his rye whiskey, number one distiller in the country at one time.

Which we were looking for a bottle today.

Yeah. I can get it. It's just going to be, it's not something you can just go find in the regular store. But in 1799, I know this one for a fact, George Washington out of Mount Vernon there distilled 11,000 barrels of whiskey, made about 7,500 bucks that year. He was the number one distiller in the country at that time.

Wait a second. He made 11,000 barrels of rye whiskey and that earned him $7,800.

Netted him. Netted him. Oh, so profit of 7,800. Profit of 7,500 bucks. I was going to say otherwise, that's a good deal. Yeah. And people think that he's the one that kind of put, he was responsible for putting down the Whiskey rebellion, but he was paying his taxes like everybody else was. It was the little guys that it hurt, you know? And so anyway, these guys were given tracks of land, so they come over and they find that Rye, doesn't grow quite as well in Kentucky as it did in the northern parts of Virginia. And so you got all that extra corn. What are you going to do? And, you know, of course, the rest is history. But so it was a mandate to plant corn more or less. Yeah. They had to play. I think I think to Homestead, you had to have was it five acres you had to grow? Whatever. If you read about Daniel Boone, he was part.

So you establish your homestead.

Yeah. Yeah. OK. And so you had to do something with the surplus. And one of the big things about the whiskey rebellion was that You couldn't pay in whiskey. You had to pay in cash. A lot of these guys, whiskey was cash. Anyway, Virginia has ties to Kentucky this way anyways, because some of those militiamen came over into Kentucky, what is now Kentucky, and basically started distilling whiskey in like 1790.

Well, as I continue to sip on this, the palate is a bit leveled out. It doesn't jut out too much in any one area. It does have that corn sweetness. It's got that little bit of spice. Now, knowing it's not rye spice, it's barrel spice. It's got a little bit more hug than I would expect. It's not overly ethanol-y. But for a young whiskey, I'm actually slightly impressed.

Yeah, I think so. For a fairly young whiskey.

For me, I probably... This wouldn't be a daily sipper for me. No, but it would be a great mixer. It'd be a great mixer. I agree. In fact, somebody we know very well is actually in the other room right now having this in a mixed drink.

Yeah. Cheers. Cheers. Bare knuckle. It's supposed to commemorate the women of the early 1900s who actually got in the ring and boxed.

Oh, really? Yes. Well, that's an interesting story. Isn't it, though? Yeah, boxing at the turn of the century was you didn't wear gloves. At the very most, you would have a patch of leather over your knuckles, right? Right.

And so it's got a woman on the front of this in her boxing pose. You know, straight bourbon whiskey distilled at 90%. So 90 proof.

So Randy, what have you been up to? So you've been outside of Kentucky now for what, about 18 months? No, just over a year. Just a little over a year and just getting settled. You're literally a mountain man now.

No. Jeremiah Johnson. No, I still get that. You ain't from around here, are you boy? But man, it's a different kind of life as you've seen, but it's great. Ride around on the four wheeler.

Yeah, so you do not have cell service here. No.

And you live literally on top of the mountain. On top of this ridge. On top of this particular ridge of the mountain, which is pretty high. We're about 2,800. It's not real high, but the rate of ascent from down in the valley coming up here.

Which is more or less, down there is more or less sea level. Yeah. And you're building a house that's about another thousand feet up, right? Right. And that house literally sits on the edge of the ridge. Overlooking another ridge that's even taller in the valley below.

And you can almost see Crabtree Falls from there. Not quite. It's around the corner. Around the corner.

So anybody that's not familiar, Crabtree Falls is about a 1,200 foot natural falls in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Would you say it's positioned equally between Lexington and Stanton?

Or even Lynchburg and Stan. Because you can't say equal between yes but over to the east anymore.

But if you're in Richmond, it's about a two hour drive. If you're in Charleston, West Virginia? Three or so. Three or so, yeah. And if you're in Washington DC, probably about three hours. About three hours. OK. All right. So not too far to get down here. You want to take a drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway?

We're a couple of miles from the Blue Ridge Parkway, a mile from the Appalachian Trail. So a lot of people congregate here to get away.

So if I, if I come up here and I hear banjo music, it's a good thing here. It's a good thing. Yeah. Okay.

When the banjo stopped, that's when there's a problem.

Well, everybody I've met up here has been really nice and you know, it seems like a great community. It's a small community. Yes. I mean, how many people live within a mile of you?

I want to say, so, you know, we just had the election and I think there was 400 and something voters that are registered to vote over here at the volunteer fire department. So, you know, there's, there's not a lot, a lot of people here. Yeah, beautiful place. I love it. I think I'll be able to retire here pretty well.

You've settled in pretty good. All right, Randy. Well, let's continue sipping on our bare knuckle. And when we come back, we'll take a little break. Gotcha. And when we come back, I have got a Virginia whiskey for you. You already know what it is, but you haven't tasted it yet. No, I haven't. All right. We'll talk again. Bye. We would like to thank Tommy and Gwen Mitchell from Loghead's Home Center for supporting this episode of the Bourbon Road. Loghead's Home Center, nestled in the hills of Kentucky, is an industry leader in building handcrafted rustic furniture. Family owned and operated, they take pride in offering only the very best for their customers. The Logheads, and that's what they like to call themselves, are skilled wood crafters who are passionate about creating rustic furniture for people who appreciate the beauty of natural wood. Owners Tommy and Gwen don't just sell the rustic lifestyle, they live it. And you can be sure that Loghead's furniture will always be handcrafted in Kentucky by artisans who embrace the simple way of life. Loghead's rustic furniture is made from northern white cedar, a sustainable wood that's naturally rotten termite resistant. Its beauty and quality will add warmth to your earthy lifestyle for generations to come. Be sure to check out everything they have to offer at LogHeadsHomeCenter.com. And while you're at it, give Tommy and Gwen a shout on Facebook or Instagram at LogHeadsHomeCenter.

Okay, well we are back and

And I kind of really enjoyed that bare knuckle from the first half. I think as we continued to sip on it during the break, I gained a little respect for it as a younger whiskey, but I think they're doing some things right there.

Oh yeah, I would agree with that. After you get past the acclimation stage, it kind of grew on me a little bit.

Yeah, I look forward to We're hearing more from them as their career stops. I agree.

Give everyone the other two or three, four years and see what this is all about.

I think those young notes will start to disappear. It'll start to get a little bit more richness to it. But the basics are there.

They are. And I'm tasting a couple of little different things. I don't know that I've ever gotten a peanut or a peanut brittle. The nuttiness was there, but it was more of a nutmeg or a pecan.

This was a little bit different.

Well, Jim, I wanted to take a minute to congratulate you and Big Chief. Mike, you guys have been killing it. I mean, you have people listening to us in Australia. We do. A long way off. And when you and I first started this, we'd have to slap somebody upside the head to get 50 listeners.

Well, you know, it takes a while to build. I mean, it's a very competitive world. You know, bourbon podcasts are lumped in with food podcasts and wine podcasts and beer podcasts. And, you know, as far as, you know, Apple iTunes, what now is called Apple Podcast is concerned, we're all one big happy family, right? Right. Food, drinks, that kind of stuff. It takes a while for people to find you in that little It does. And people are looking at ratings. Advertisers are looking at ratings. People are looking at ratings and reviews. And it just takes a while to build up that following and start climbing the charts and get to a place where you're kind of comfortable and doing well. Right.

And I want to send a shout out to the roadies, the bourbon roadies. This is, man, I'll tell you what I enjoy. Every now and again, I'll get on Facebook or whatever, Instagram and see You know, somebody found a unicorn. You know, hey, I've been looking for months for this one particular thing here. And so what a community. Yeah. Bourbon Roadies, you guys are awesome. Thanks for listening to these guys because they're doing it right for you. And anyway, keep up the good work. And you're a roadie. Oh yeah. One of the original roadies.

Probably so. Almost the original roadie.

But no, it's fun keeping up with you guys. So congratulations and you all keep doing what you're doing and keep, hey, roadies keep traveling down that bourbon road. We will.

We're lucky this time the road led to Virginia. Virginia, yep. And happy to be here. I am bringing to you today a rye whiskey from Virginia. Oh, what a big surprise. Jim, a rye from you? And, you know, Virginia, as we discussed in the first half, is well known for rye. Yes, it is. One of the most famous humans on the planet made some of the very best rye. of the time here in Virginia. At the time, yeah. We won't say it's better than stuff made today.

And you know what? You're going to have to come back, and we'll go to Mount Vernon and get some. Because the only way you can get George Washington's rye whiskey is to either go to Mount Vernon or have it shipped somewhere in the DC, Virginia area. But we'll do that, save that for another time.

Yeah, that'll be fun because I really like to taste that. We have had some people on the show before that have talked about that.

Chris Morris, when we did that over there at Woodford with Chris Morris and, you know, Elizabeth O'Neill McCall, he was talking about how they put that still back together. I think it was 2005. Yeah. But I understand you have a rye for me here that's been very well been awarded. Probably the most awarded whiskey in Virginia.

Yeah, so the Catoctin rye. Now, how do you say that?

I'm assuming I'm right. Catoctin. I'm going to call it a concoction.

So yeah, go ahead. C-A-T-O-C-T-I-N, Catoctin Creek. And they're out of an area west of Washington DC, very near Harpers Ferry, called Purcellville. And they have a female master distiller there. Oh, wow. OK. So Becky Harris is their chief distiller there. And they make some well-received whiskeys there. And their rye is well-respected and has received many awards. And I've not had it before, personally. I never have either, even though I lived here. So as a rye lover, I'm ready to try a Virginia rye. Sure. This one we're having today is the Catoctin Creek Roundstone rye. This is a distillers edition rye. So they have an 80 proof, and then this is a 92 proof distillers edition. It is called the round stone rye and it's a single barrel. And it's not age stated though, so we're not sure of the age of this. But it is 100% rye mashbill. 100%. 100% rye. So we both know from the many discussions we've had with distillers in the path that that's quite the challenge, is to make a high rye mashbill because rye doesn't play well in the fermenters. It tends to like to bubble up and overflow. Well, I'll tell you what, they played well on the nose on this thing. Yeah, let's check it out.

Butterscotch? Am I off?

No, I'm getting butterscotch, but I'm also getting that barrel oak, you know, that barrel note that I don't want to call it young oak because it's not young oak. I'm getting that youthful oak note. It does have a good nose. Not great, but good. I think I enjoy that. It's got a little bit of a fruity note to the, just a hint of a fruity note there but it's got some anise. I always say anise. That's my reference to a licorice, anise, fennel kind of thing.

Yeah. Almost like a liqueur. You know what I'm saying? The smell is.

But I like it. The only thing for me is that sort of a, that little bit of a woody note there. Gotcha. You know, a little bit off-putting but not too bad. Alright, let's taste it.

Cheers.

Oh, that's sweet. Sweet and it's smooth all the way across. Yeah, it doesn't have that mid palate spice, but it really gets you on the sides and the back of the tongue. Kind of sits there. I want to continue sipping on that.

I thought that I would get something across the middle and I did not. It went straight across and back and the finish was actually, man.

Yeah, and so the oak is coming through a little bit more and not so youthful on the back of the pallet. So it actually, it's a nice oak on the back of the pallet.

But even though I smelled butterscotch, I did not taste it. I got almost like a vanilla cream kind of thing.

You know, it's, um, it, it does have a very nice mouth feel. It's got a, uh, kind of an oily buttery, but it dissipates real quickly.

Is this, let me check the bottle later. Okay. This is not Jill filtered. Okay.

Yeah. It dissipates. Um, it, the finish on it is, uh, kind of medium. Yeah.

We don't know the age on this at all then.

It's not stated. Now I've heard that they use smaller barrels. I've heard that they... Now, I can't confirm that. How small? 30 gallon. 30 gallon. 30 gallon dollars, but they're not 15 gallon, but smaller barrels. Whether or not they still do that or that's their way of operating now, I'm not sure. But you know, Catoctin Creek, if you're listening to this, reach out to us. We're happy to make any corrections that we might get wrong. But I will tell you this, I like it. I do. I think it's a good rye. I think it's got a nice, it's not a balanced, because the nose and the palate are not really joined well together, but they're both enjoyable. I think the nose a little bit got that youthful oaky note to it. But the palate, palate's a little bit better on that part.

And you know, there was the day way back when, when I didn't think I would like a rye. And then how long came the Carters and that number three and then wilderness trail did something right. Jim turned me on to these rise and you know what? I really like them now.

You know, when I'm drinking whiskeys that are under four years in age, sometimes I get this note and it's kind of, and I don't know how to put my finger on it, but have you ever had a Necco candy? No, I have not. They're like a wafer, chalky wafer candy. Okay. Okay. It probably been a while since you had one, but they're like a chalky wafer. And every now and then I will get that, but I don't remember the last time I got that on a rye. I'm getting a little bit of it now. Really? On the finish, a little bit of chalkiness, kind of a little bit drying. I like the finish on it. I think it outperforms the front end of the palette. I think it's kind of a little bit, it's the nicer part of this. Okay.

I will agree that it outperforms the front.

Yeah. So in that case, when you have the back of the palate and the front of the palate disjointed, the nose disjointed from the palate, you're talking about something that's not well balanced. But balance isn't always. what you're going for, right? Sometimes you're looking for that something out of the box, something a little bit different. I think this is a good ride. I think 92 proof is probably still a bit low for it. I think that they have their 80 proof expression and their 92 proof expression. I would be looking for something a little bit higher proof on this. And you know me, if it's at that 100 bottle and bond level kind of thing, that's kind of where I'm at.

100 is just I don't know, 100% me.

Yeah. Well, for this one, I think it's fair to say that I would sip on this because I think it's very respectable. I think it earned its awards. They're quite well deserved. I've got a particular rye, I like the profile that I'm after. This doesn't necessarily match that, but that doesn't mean it's not a good rye. This is probably something that a lot of people would find very nice. So, if I'm sitting around the fire and I bring this out and I say, have some of this, you'd be okay. Oh, I'd absolutely be okay. I would love to sip on this. This is fine. It's just not in my core profile. I think those youthful oak notes that I'm getting from it, they're kind of an indication, I think, maybe if they are still using the smaller barrels, those smaller barrels will introduce that oak quicker into that smaller amount of juice.

And stay for a longer period of time, probably. Yes.

But anyway, my hat's off to Catoctin Creek. I think they've made a fine whiskey here. I think for me, it's a sipper. Probably not going to share a bottle with some, you know, not going to invite my friends over and say, hey, you got to try this Catoctin Creek. Probably not going to wrap up a bottle as a gift and give it to somebody. But will I sip on it around the fire? Absolutely.

Yeah. I didn't know what to expect from some, you know, what Virginia was doing. You know, when you get in Kentucky, You kind of get spoiled, I guess you could say, and came over here. But I'm pleasantly surprised with both of these, with Bear Knuckle and... Yeah, I think both of these distilleries are both young distilleries.

So Catoctin Creek started in 2009, and Bear Knuckle started in 2015, you said, right? So these are both relatively young distilleries that are still finding their way, finding their path to what they want to be long term. And you know, it's very difficult in the beginning, particularly in the middle of a whiskey boom, you know, bourbon boom, that you would you would produce whiskeys and have a hard time keeping the shelves full because they're under such great demand. So a lot of times it's hard for them to have aging stocks that are maturing to the level where you and I like to see them simply because they're flying off the shelf so fast that they've got to just keep producing. So I think they'll get a chance in the future to catch up.

To put some in reserve and actually age some and experiment on that back end of that.

And hone their craft and decide, you know, which expressions need a little more TLC and which ones are already spot on and they just want to continue to age. So yeah, hats off to both these distilleries. Catoctin Creek, I think, is a little more well known and more widely distributed than Bare Knuckle.

Well, KO, this isn't all that KO does is the bare knuckle, but I had never heard of it before until I saw that program. Because when I first go in and I start looking at bourbons, this isn't where I would have looked first. We had to seek these out, if you will. But unlike you, hats off. It's going to be interesting to see what they do in the future.

So you and I are still spending a little bit of time together. We've been here with you guys for three days now. And in the course of those three days, you have absolutely introduced us to the Appalachian lifestyle.

Well, what did you think about the Siderese? Because Virginia is really known for that. And it was something, believe it or not, Thomas Jefferson really enjoyed doing over at Monticello, too. You know, you guys had a little bit of that experience today.

Yeah, I thought it was good. We visited two different cideries and so I was a little bit surprised at what a Virginia cider is. As a Virginia cider is a little bit more like what you would expect to get in a brew pub if you order a cider, a little bit more effervescent, more seltzer-y. Seltzer-y, that's a good word. Kind of in my history, in my past, I'm more used to more of a hard cider, non carbonated? Yeah, non carbonated ciders. But that's the way they do it here.

And so I'm used to North Georgia cider. Yeah. You know, and these aren't quite as sweet. In fact, I heard somebody is almost like a an apple beer a little bit or an apple seltzer. Yeah.

And the flavors are faint. So they're faint. So it's not in your face. You're not going to get cinnamon all up in your face.

This is just a little it's a little bit different. It's different.

Yeah, I enjoyed it. The cideries here are beautiful. They're just like what you would expect going to a distillery, a small craft distillery anywhere else. You're going to find the equipment and the bar and the tasting bar and the shop and all the things, the flights and the other things that you do. It's pretty neat.

A lot of things to do in Virginia, just saying.

Yeah. Well, I particularly enjoyed your introduction to ATV cross country.

It's a little different than what you'll find in parts of, well, say South Georgia and Tennessee. You can get some of this in Tennessee and Eastern Kentucky, but you almost do a little rock hopping here.

Yeah.

And so, um, yeah, it's, you know, how many people get to run an ATV trail down, down the side of the Thai river, you know?

Yeah, so you took us to a little hidden waterfall. I shouldn't say a little. We're not going to tell anybody where it is. But you took me to a waterfall that is probably 200 to 300 feet tall and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of gallons coming through that a minute.

I mean, just a wash. You came here right after rain. Yeah. So you're going to get that during the summertime. It's not a trickle. There's always water on that particular waterfall. Just like there's always water coming down Crab Creek Falls. You know, you're always going to get it because we're at the top, you know, but you came right after that. And so whereas I would have walked across, I'm not going to do that now.

I'll be washed away. So if somebody's come into this area and they say, hey, you know, I want to go to the Blue Ridge Mountains and I want to go to the Appalachian Trail, I want to go to the the area that Jim and Randy talked about on the show that time. What are they looking for here? Where should they go and what should they visit?

Well, if you're talking about just the Montebello area here, there's only about two or three places. You've got where the Montebello Country Store is. There's a campground right across from there and a little trout pond. Just down the road from there is Crabtree Falls and they've got a little camping area there. If you want a place to stay, most people come here to hike. Like I said, Montebello itself is less than a mile from the trail leading up to the Appalachian Trail, and Spyrock and the Priest are there. Talk about beautiful places. Spyrock and the Priest, those are two places that are well known on the Appalachian Trail. They are, and people will make day trips there and head out before sunrise so they can watch the sun.

And how far from here, if we hop on the Blue Ridge Parkway, how far from here to say Wintergreen Ski Resort?

From here, you're probably looking at 35 minutes or so when you don't run into fog like we did when we were on there. Wintergreen Ski Resorts, less than 45 minutes away.

From Wintergreen, you've got cideries, you've got distilleries, you've got breweries, you've got all kinds of different places you can go to, a lot of different restaurants. What about historical places?

Well, just down the road from Montebello is where Cyrus McCormick basically, I guess you could say, presented the first grain reaper and went on to do, you know, to start International Harvester and any farmer around knows what International Harvester is.

It started out as McCormick and then McCormick Deering and became International Harvester.

Yeah, and so the first grain reaper was actually You know, try it out right here and steals down the road there and steals Tavern. And so, you know, down the road is where Sam Houston was born. Then you get to Lexington and, you know, there's, you know, Robert Lee's buried there with his horse and family and, you know, Stonewall Jackson's place is there and, you know, Monticello's basically right outside of which is Thomas Jefferson's home.

Right. And then we're, like you said, two hours from Richmond, three hours from DC. So there is both civil war and revolutionary war, historical sites around here. That's true.

And three hours to jump on, you can head down and hit the Amtrak train and stand there and head up to DC and take some transportation in or try to drive yourself. And Smithsonian's there. And I will say this about the Smithsonian. I had an uncle take me there when I was a teenager. And at that time, What one of the people at the museum told us is you could stand in front of every item on display at the Smithsonian for two seconds and it would take you 70 years to see everything they had to see and everything that they have is not on display.

I thought I'd seen it all. I lived in DC for... Well, I didn't live in DC. I actually lived in Woodbridge, which is very close to Manassas. Right. And I worked in Arlington in Crystal City and every member of my family would come visit and my friends would come visit and anybody I knew in my entire life would come visit because now they knew somebody in Washington DC. Right. So, on everybody's list was the Smithsonian and It seems like I felt like I'd seen the whole thing, but obviously from what you just said, not even close.

No, there's just so much. In the history here, Most of it is, a lot of it, you know, you got the 1700s and then you've got Jamestown just down the road there, you know. Roanoke. Roanoke. And so, you know, we're talking 1600s.

Yeah, you're in the core of like early American history here.

There's a lot of- And I love it. My wife accuses me of reading the sign. She goes, you read the sign, tell me what it said. Yeah, a lot of great stuff to do here. I'm gonna be very satisfied to go. me a cup of coffee and sit out on that deck and look out over the ridge, watch the seasons change, and sip on some good stuff.

Well, Randy, it's been a pleasure to visit with you again. I think you will always be an honorary co-host of the Bourbon Road.

Hey, I always appreciate it. This has been fun. And keep chasing that unicorn dream out there, because it's fun to see somebody score a big one. You know they've been working for a while to get that. Absolutely. Absolutely.

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Nobody will jump on you for your review. Now they might disagree with you, but they're not going to trash your review. Right, right. So we invite you to come onto the bourbon roadies and spend a little time with us. We've got master distillers in there, industry experts. Virtually everybody who's ever been on the show is a bourbon roadie. And we're just a good group of people that like the same thing. We also have an Instagram page at The Bourbon Road. By the way, our Facebook page is at The Bourbon Road. We have a website called thebourbonroad.com. And on The Bourbon Road website, you'll find our blog. Mike does a blog every week on our long format show, which is an hour long show with a guest usually. On Mondays, we do a craft distillery Monday review, which is a review of a craft bourbon or Sometimes a big boy, but it's usually a short format show, and usually we'll release a recipe at the end there of something to do with bourbon cooking. It's kind of neat. Mike couldn't be with us today. You can find him at One Big Chief. I'm JayShannon63, and we will see you down the bourbon road. We do appreciate all of our listeners, and we'd like to thank you for taking time out of your day to hang out with us here on the Bourbon Road. We hope you enjoyed today's show, and if so, we would appreciate it if you'd subscribe and rate us a five star with a review on iTunes. Make sure you follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at The Bourbon Road. That way you'll be kept in the loop in all the Bourbon Road happenings. You can also visit our website at thebourbonroad.com to read our blog, listen to the show, or reach out to us directly. We always welcome comments or suggestions. And if you have an idea for a particular guest or topic, be sure to let us know. And again, thanks for hanging out with us.