Steamboat Bay Resort on Noyes Island, Alaska gives a top-tier all-inclusive expertise that whisky lovers can enjoyment of.
A terrific trip doesn’t must be all about whisky, however a wee dram or artisanal cocktail alongside the way in which definitely enhances the expertise. One of the best getaways for whisky lovers mix cozy lodging with enjoyable actions, scrumptious meals, heat hospitality, and of course a wonderful number of whiskies. Such nice escapes will be discovered everywhere in the nation and world wide—you’ll be able to squeeze in a little bit of enjoyable on an extended weekend or fly throughout the Atlantic to sojourn within the British Isles. Whether or not you a select journey targeted on snowboarding, fishing, mountaineering, {golfing}, or simply rest with cooking courses and spa remedies, fabulous whisky-fueled adventures await. We’ve chosen 10 of the most effective such getaway choices.
Sea Island Resort has not one, however two separate accommodations, together with The Lodge (pictured), the place the primary bar serves a number of hundred Outdated Usual cocktails a day.
Sea Island—Sea Island, Georgia
For practically a century, Sea Island Resort has been certainly one of America’s most venerable trip venues. The resort options infinite selections, with two separate accommodations—The Lodge and The Cloister—in addition to golf cottages and all kinds of rental-home lodging, an acclaimed spa, and over a dozen eating and ingesting spots unfold throughout this big coastal property.
Sea Island is a legendary golf vacation spot, with a brand new state-of-the-art efficiency instructing heart, grass placing course, and three 18-hole layouts that host the annual PGA Tour RSM Traditional. However non-golfers won’t ever really feel excluded right here. The place has 5 miles of pristine personal seaside, biking, boating, inshore and offshore fishing, falconry, a formidable tennis heart with 16 clay courts, horseback using, taking pictures sports activities, scenic and cocktail cruises, swimming pools, and an array of watersports together with kayaking, stand-up paddleboarding, bodyboarding, kiteboarding, and quite a few guided paddling excursions. The schedule of day by day occasions gives excursions, excursions, and guided actions, whereas the seaside membership, spa, and health heart are all world class. There’s even bowling and a night bagpiper!
All of those actions can depart company thirsty, which might be why the primary bar at The Lodge, the Oak Room, serves a number of hundred bourbon Outdated Usual cocktails every day, and gives quite a few personal label single cask pours together with Woodford Reserve, Weller Single Barrel Reserve, and Buffalo Hint. That is the South, so bourbon is king, however the resort usually gives 60 to 70 whiskies, together with rye, scotch, and Japanese labels.
The Lodge additionally barrel-ages home cocktails, and the signature is an Outdated Usual served on the resort’s high-end steakhouse, Colt & Alison. Aged in a five-liter oak barrel to deliver out extra vanilla and spice notes, it’s made utilizing Resurgent rye from Atlanta’s ASW Distillery.
Low season resort charges begin round $650 per evening per couple, $1,000 in prime summer time.
Bertie’s Whisky Bar at The Fife Arms gives over 350 whiskies from world wide.
The Fife Arms—Braemar, Scotland
Outdated meets new at this boutique property that opened three years in the past within the Scottish village of Braemar, birthplace of the nation’s famed Highland Video games. The previous teaching inn and searching lodge is a neighborhood landmark in-built 1856. Its homeowners are Iwan and Manuela Wirth, founders of the famend worldwide artwork gallery Hauser & Wirth, who oversaw a meticulous restoration, showcasing greater than 14,000 historic objects and artifacts. The result’s trendy luxurious with 19th-century Highlands aptitude, together with loads of tartan and museum-quality Scottish paintings. All 46 rooms at this escapist, romantic resort are distinctive, and the gardens had been designed by the identical panorama architect utilized by Prince Charles. An enormous slate of outside actions is on supply, together with guided mountaineering, E-biking, and horseback using. Strive fly-fishing on the River Dee, one of many world’s most well-known salmon spots, with sea and rainbow trout as effectively. A five-minute stroll connects to the paths of beautiful Cairngorms Nationwide Park, with hikes for all talents. The welcoming 18-hole Braemar Golf Membership is close by, and different choices embrace off-road 4×4 safaris by way of Vary Rover, excursions of Balmoral Fort (the royal residence in Scotland), and the close by Royal Lochnagar Distillery.
However you don’t have to go away The Fife Arms to dive deep into Scotland’s most well-known product. The resort’s Bertie’s Whisky Bar options 365 labels from world wide, overseen by whisky ambassador Katy Fennema. She gives a number of themed four-dram flights, guided tastings, a meals and whisky pairing workshop, and a mixed modern structure/advantageous whisky tour at Macallan Distillery’s new customer heart. The signature at Bertie’s is Fife Arms Braemar whisky, a proprietary blended malt from Adelphi Distillery created to commemorate the opening of Bertie’s in 2021. The whisky goals to mimic the fashion and taste of these from the late Victorian and Edwardian eras when the resort was constructed, mixing sherry-cask completed Highland malts with smokier variations from Ardnamurchan Distillery on Scotland’s distant west coast.
Packages together with one 3-course dinner and one 4-dram tasting per keep begin at round $650 per evening per couple.
On the open bar inside the lodge at Steamboat Bay Fishing Membership, top-shelf whiskies are all the time being poured.
Steamboat Bay Fishing Membership—Noyes Island, Alaska
Alaska is the gold customary for salmon fishing and residential to quite a few angling lodges, and Steamboat Bay Fishing Membership—located on an island off the coast of Alaska about midway between Seattle and Anchorage—is the best. Steamboat Bay runs on the identical all-inclusive mannequin as the most effective African wildlife safari lodges, however as a substitute of providing a non-public ranger and Land Cruiser, every room right here comes with its personal fishing information and a 27-foot heated cabin cruiser geared up with a toilet and sort out. This coastal spot on the sting of the Pacific gives distinctive fishing, particularly for prized Chinook (King) and Coho (Silver) salmon, in addition to halibut. Charges embrace on-site processing of all catch into steaks or filets, that are flash frozen and packed in customized freezer bins to take residence.
Non-fishing exercise choices vary from sea kayaking, whale watching, and nature walks to cigar smoking and sizzling tubbing. Seaplane transfers into this distant island lodge are included in charges, as are all gourmand meals and the top-shelf open bar. The checklist modifications however all the time consists of many bourbons, like Maker’s Mark, Knob Creek, and Woodford Reserve; scotch, together with Macallan 12 yr outdated, Lagavulin 16 yr outdated, and Johnnie Walker Gold; in addition to rye, Canadian, and Irish choices. However the native favourite is Alaska’s personal Port Chilkoot Boatwright bourbon, by itself or in native takes on the traditional Outdated Usual or Manhattan. A particular Drink of the Day typically options it. One instance is the Grapefruit Ginger Beer Bourbon, made with Boatwright bourbon, grapefruit juice, and ginger beer. There are simply six rooms within the lodge and a single eight-bedroom residence.
Steamboat Bay is open seasonally from June to August and charges for 2, three, and four-day all-inclusive stays start at about $2,600 per evening per particular person.
The Lodge at Blue Sky’s 3,500-acre property gives entry to infinite out of doors actions, a spa, cooking and artwork courses, and extra. (Picture by Excessive West Distillery)
The Lodge at Blue Sky—Wanship, Utah
Born within the Napa Valley, Auberge Resorts is famously related to wine, however at this ranch-style property outdoors Park Metropolis, the main focus is squarely on whiskey. That’s as a result of The Lodge at Blue Sky, a 3,500-acre resort group, consists of each the Auberge Lodge at Blue Sky and Excessive West’s distillery simply down the street. Excessive West started with a tiny facility whose declare to fame is being the world’s first “ski-in gastro-distillery,” on the base of one of many runs at Park Metropolis Resort, the nation’s largest ski space. The newer location at Blue Sky is way bigger and options organized excursions and tastings, a full retail retailer with distillery-only restricted editions, and a standout restaurant targeted on domestically sourced elements.
Whereas possession is separate, The Lodge works carefully with the distillery, and company will be pushed, bike, or make the 15-minute stroll there. The Lodge has simply 46 spacious rooms and suites, that includes deluxe bogs and out of doors dwelling areas. Consistent with the Auberge model, The Lodge has a gourmand restaurant and high-end spa, The Edge, the place one of the crucial standard remedies is the Excessive West Whisky Rubdown—that includes a foot soak combining salts from Utah’s Nice Salt Lake with Excessive West whiskey, adopted by a physique therapeutic massage, heat and chilly moist towel compresses, a foot scrub, and scalp invigorator.
The Lodge additionally has all kinds of different actions, starting from cooking courses, artwork courses, and fondue dinners in personal mountaintop yurts to summer time horseback using, mountaineering, mountain biking, and fly-fishing. In winter, there’s snowboarding and snowboarding, and the resort has its personal personal clubhouse on the mountain for altering and storage, with a full bar, gourmand snacks, and complimentary shuttles. Different close by actions embrace cross-country snowboarding, snowmobiling, and heli-skiing. On the property, there’s snowshoeing, year-round sporting clays, yoga, and extra. The Lodge conducts its personal tastings, and along with an intensive Excessive West lineup carries different Utah whiskeys from Alpine Distillery and Clear Water Distillery, whereas the signature tasting is a side-by-side comparability of Kentucky Owl 10 yr outdated bourbon and the model’s rarer Confiscated expression.
Low season charges start round $1,450 per evening per couple, summer time charges at $2,100.
Certainly one of two Maker’s Mark Hobbit Homes on The Protect Sporting Membership property.
The Protect Sporting Membership—Richmond, R.I.
A hidden gem of the Northeast, this 3,500-acre wonderland is an ideal weekend getaway, simply half an hour from Windfall, beneath 90 minutes from Boston, and fewer than three hours from New York Metropolis. It is usually very canine pleasant. Actions characteristic a top-rated 18-hole par-3 golf course, stocked fly-fishing ponds, miles of mountain biking and mountaineering trails, ziplining, canoeing, kayaking, stand-up paddleboarding, archery, tennis and equestrian facilities, plus a wellness facility with a gymnasium and day by day yoga courses, a number of bars and eating places, and a spa. The Protect focuses on taking pictures sports activities, together with a 10-station 5-stand vary, a big and diversified 19-stand sporting clays course, and the longest automated indoor taking pictures vary within the U.S. Winter actions add cross-country snowboarding, snowmobiling, and snowshoeing. For these not used to the sporting life-style, the well-stocked Borrowing Closet is useful, in partnership with famed British boot and out of doors clothes model Hunter, lending company all-weather footwear and outerwear.
The residential group has choices from condos to tiny homes to luxurious residences, with most provided as nightly leases, together with the hotel-style Hilltop Lodge, that includes condo suites with kitchens. Simply down the hill from the lodge is a picket platform with out of doors furnishings, hearth pits, and two luxurious African safari-themed tents—one for cigars, the opposite for whisky. The Protect has partnered with Cohiba cigars and Laphroaig whisky to create a non-public tasting expertise that features Laphroaig 10 yr outdated, 25 yr outdated, Choose, Lore, and Quarter Cask single malts together with Cohiba cigars like Royale and Black Gigante. A personal tasting expertise will be booked virtually anytime, however on Thursdays and Sundays the tents function like a bar, so anybody can cease by for a drink.
The property additionally consists of two Maker’s Mark Hobbit Homes that supply a storybook setting for a four-course lunch or dinner that features a Maker’s Mark flight. The seasonal menu is paired with customary Maker’s Mark, 46, Cask Energy, and Non-public Choice Protect Reserve. Elsewhere on the property, there are practically 5 dozen whisky selections, together with Hakushu and Yamazaki Japanese single malts, Bowmore 50 yr outdated, Talisker 25 yr outdated, and Little E book, amongst others. Essentially the most distinctive providing, due to the Laphroaig affiliation, is the very uncommon 30 yr outdated Ian Hunter Chapter 1.
Exercise packages embrace two sporting choices day by day and begin round $500 per evening per couple in winter and $750 in summer time.
The Lodge at Spruce Peak is a four-season resort that showcases many Vermont producers.
The Lodge at Spruce Peak—Stowe, Vt.
The Lodge is the most effective resort at Vermont’s most well-known ski resort, however Stowe is likely one of the uncommon ski cities that’s busier in summer time, due to infinite festivals, farmers markets, nice mountaineering and biking, plus many different out of doors pursuits. The Lodge is a dog-friendly four-season hotspot: In winter it’s Stowe’s solely ski-in choice, and from spring to fall it gives company entry to the in any other case personal Mountain Course, ranked No. 1 in Vermont by Golf Advisor. There’s an ice rink, guided and self-guided snowshoeing and mountaineering, fats tire winter biking, and cross-country snowboarding, all on-site. A year-round performing arts heart will get nationwide touring acts like Little Feat, and The Lodge has one of many nicest spas within the state.
A current renovation added the brand new Alpine Corridor restaurant, which showcases a broad array of Vermont producers, from cheesemakers to farmers, and, most notably, debuted the WhistlePig Pavilion. This venue options WhistlePig’s 10, 12, 15, and 18 yr outdated ryes, Farmstock, Piggyback, The Boss Hog VII Magellan’s Atlantic, and VIII Lapulapu’s Pacific, plus a slate of rye cocktails. In summer time the tasting bar is a barbecue joint, whereas in winter it morphs into an alpine fondue-and-raclette shack with personal heated pergolas. The Pavilion hosts stay music each Saturday, and its barrel-aged Outdated Usual options WhistlePig 10 yr outdated and the distillery’s personal farmstead Vermont maple syrup and maple bitters.
Ski season charges start at round $360 per evening, summer time charges at round $280, with extra reductions for members of Hyatt’s rewards program.
Park Resort Kenmore gives out of doors pursuits aplenty alongside 4,000 whisky alternatives on the Cocktail Bar, residence to certainly one of Europe’s most expansive whisky collections.
Park Resort Kenmare—Kenmare, Eire
Inbuilt 1897, Park Resort Kenmare is a hidden gem in County Kerry, one of the crucial stunning components of Eire. Located on 12 acres overlooking Kenmare Bay, Park Resort Kenmare gives one other shock—the Cocktail Bar—residence to certainly one of Europe’s largest whisky collections. Resident whisky knowledgeable John Moriarty, who can be a specialist teacher on the Dublin Bar Academy, can steer company via a surprising checklist of about 4,000 alternatives from world wide. When he’s holding court docket within the bar, he gives personal tasting classes. When he’s not, he’s typically main company on the resort’s day by day guided hikes.
The Park Resort sits alongside the famed Kerry Method mountaineering path, and likewise gives practically each different out of doors pursuit you may anticipate finding in Eire: horseback using, biking, fishing, falconry, tennis, and croquet—in addition to complimentary yoga, chi move, and meditation courses day by day. The resort even has its personal 18-hole golf course. Wish to attempt one thing completely different? Go scuba diving or wakeboarding, or kayak out to view the seals on Kenmare Bay. And in contrast to at many prime Irish nation resorts, it’s a simple stroll from The Park into the charming city of Kenmare, the place you’ll be able to go to pubs, retailers, and eating places
The Park is owned by Francis and John Brennan, Irish brothers who’ve grow to be native celebrities due to their hit TV collection “At Your Service”—a present during which they assist different hospitality homeowners make over their accommodations and eating places. The Park’s personal assortment of eating choices is spectacular, with a concentrate on advantageous eating provided within the Eating Room, whereas the Out of doors Terrace is a much less formal spot to take pleasure in breakfast or afternoon tea. On the Cocktail Bar, Moriarty’s favourite is the Spot vary of single pot nonetheless Irish whiskeys—notably Inexperienced Spot Chateau Léoville Barton, matured in sherry and bourbon barrels and completed in wine casks from Bordeaux’s famend Chateau Léoville Barton. The resort’s Champagne Bar gives dozens of choices together with Krug, Salon, and Taittinger Comtes de Champagne.
Low season nightly charges start round $350 for 2, and in summer time from $600.
Along with housing a brewery and a distillery, Brush Creek Ranch encourages company towards all kinds of outside actions, together with fly fishing.
Brush Creek Ranch—Saratoga, Wyoming
Brush Creek is likely one of the most extensively geared up visitor ranches within the U.S. This 30,000-acre web site consists of two lodging choices: the Magee Homestead, a luxurious, adults-only expertise, and the Lodge & Spa, which welcomes households. The Farm at Brush Creek, in the meantime, gives a deep dive into the foods and drinks scene. Its facilities embrace a seed-to-table restaurant that includes produce grown on-site, a creamery, a bakery, a cavernous wine cellar, and The Spirit Vault, a speakeasy-style area with a secret entrance, which gives greater than 100 whiskies targeted on uncommon and small batch expressions. The Farm even has its personal brewery and distillery, the latter producing whiskey, vodka, and gin. The distillery gives an in-depth sensory expertise on how spirits are created at The Farm—encompassing a distillery tour, the historic background of its spirits, their connection to the land and setting, and an elevated tasting ($300) of Brush Creek’s whiskeys—which embrace a bourbon and rye—in addition to its vodka and gin. This expertise will be upgraded so as to add a barrel tasting, which gives a sneak peek of the distillery’s spirits at their varied levels of maturation ($450).
When company are usually not consuming or imbibing, the resort gives a broad assortment of outside actions. Most are included within the nightly charges, which additionally cowl all meals and lots of grownup drinks. In winter there’s cross-country snowboarding, snowshoeing, snowmobiling, skating, and ice fishing, whereas summer time options fly-fishing, mountaineering, mountain climbing, ATV adventures, mountain biking, archery, mountaineering, and golf on the personal Outdated Baldy Membership close by. Horseback using, taking pictures sports activities, yoga, and cooking courses are provided year-round. A number of culinary experiences tie into the distillery, just like the spent mash from the whiskey-making course of getting used to create The Bakery’s spent-grain bread, and char from the distillery’s barrels is used to make cheese at The Creamery.
The country stylish lodging at The Lodge embrace 19 rooms and 25 personal cabins. Signature pours out there on the property’s bars embrace two proprietary wine cask-finished blends of straight bourbons in partnership with prestigious Napa Valley wineries: Brush Creek Honig, utilizing Honig Winery cabernet casks, and Brush Creek Chimney Rock completed in French oak cabernet casks.
All-inclusive charges begin round $2,000 per couple per evening in winter and $3,100 in summer time.
The stage at Analog is certainly one of two efficiency venues inside the Hutton Resort.
Hutton Resort—Nashville, Tenn.
In recent times Music Metropolis has grow to be one of many nation’s hottest weekend getaway locations, and amongst Nashville’s many boutique accommodations, the lately renovated Hutton stands out for each whisky and music lovers (and for canine homeowners, as it’s pet pleasant). The in depth artwork assortment all through the property is music-themed, and the Hutton has in-room turntables for listening to a big number of unique albums from its Vinyl Library. The resort additionally boasts a full recording studio, the place visiting skilled acts gap as much as work on new materials. There are two stay music areas: one within the foyer, whereas the opposite is town’s greatest resort efficiency venue, Analog, a 300-seat acoustically superior theater that has hosted Grammy Award-winning acts. Due to partnerships with Nashville-based instrument firm Fender, the Hutton additionally gives actions you received’t discover anyplace else, just like the Fender Keep & Play Experiences, two-night packages for novices who wish to study to play or for musicians to enhance their expertise with in-room personal instruction and loaner guitars, basses, and ukuleles.
Analog has partnerships with native whiskey makers Nelson’s Inexperienced Brier and Jack Daniel. The bar carries uncommon choices from each, together with single barrel bottlings of Jack Daniel’s and allotted labels of Nelson Inexperienced Brier’s Belle Meade. That’s simply a part of the bourbon-centric checklist, which incorporates choices from Willett, WhistlePig, and Outdated Rip Van Winkle. The Hutton’s featured cocktail is the Bourbon Belle Outdated Usual, with Belle Meade Reserve, maple syrup, and Angostura and Peychaud’s bitters, garnished with an orange peel.
Rooms are sometimes out there for beneath $300 an evening, and at peak instances start round $450.
Biking excursions of the Kentucky Bourbon Path from journey specialist Backroads characteristic dinners and distillery visits.
Backroads Kentucky Bourbon Path Bike Journey—Louisville, Ky.
A number of years in the past, Kentucky’s tourism authority mapped out a biking route via the state’s prime bourbon-producing space between Louisville and Lexington. Backroads, the nation’s oldest and largest energetic journey specialist, was the primary firm to supply turnkey guided biking excursions of the Kentucky Bourbon Path. By offering high-quality bikes, GPS computer systems with turn-by-turn navigation, knowledgeable guides, baggage shuttling from one lodging to the following, and van assist with the choice to chop rides brief or keep away from unhealthy climate, that is by far the simplest technique to undertake this distinctive energetic trip.
The journeys (the primary providing is a 5 day/4 evening bundle) begin and finish on the Omni Louisville Resort on town’s downtown Whiskey Row, giving company the choice of extending their keep earlier than or after. A number of distilleries and customer facilities are inside strolling distance of the resort, together with Angel’s Envy, Evan Williams, Rabbit Gap, and Outdated Forester. Every day consists of a number of using route choices of various lengths and challenges, visits to points of interest similar to 18th-century Fort Harrod, Shaker Village, thoroughbred horse farms, the must-see cities of Frankfort and Georgetown, and a night of fireplace bluegrass music. 4 of the times embrace VIP distillery visits or tastings at 4 Roses, Woodford Reserve, Fort and Key, and a non-public barrel tasting and mixing expertise at craft distillery Bourbon 30.
Every evening consists of entry to a restaurant or resort with an intensive bourbon choice, with luxe lodging on the Versailles-inspired Kentucky Fort and Lexington’s 21c Museum Resort. The 5 day/4-night bundle is obtainable a number of instances from April to June and September to October. Customized personal excursions can be found at different instances. With diversified day by day choices, routes are rated at issue ranges 2 to 4 on Backroads’s 5-point scale. Decisions of bikes embrace efficiency street, tandem, touring, or E-bikes. To begin issues off with a bang, on the finish of day one, a information awaits using company within the resort car parking zone with a welcome cocktail—the Backroads Kentucky Mule, made with 4 Roses bourbon, Kentucky-made ginger soda Ale-8-1, a touch of lime, and a recent mint sprig.
Most dates are $3,300-$3,650 per particular person and are practically all-inclusive.
