I really love when time passes and you get to try whiskies from distilleries you have disregard out of pure prejudice, specially when everybody says that a second chance can change your whole concept of it. For me, this is the case of Glenfarclas. A distillery which their core expressions gave me a red apple juice profile that i honestly seemed to find a little boring. Well, my opinion has turned 180 degrees, since now i got to try some of their non-mainstream stuff, and i now recognize i have been missing some serious single malts here. When i visited the distillery, which is overwhelmingly beautiful, i got to try this 2002 vintage distillery exclusive, bottled on 2023 for the Spirit of Speyside festival, at 54.3%abv. On the nose a super nice aroma, that started with a 70-80% pure dark chocolate, red fruits and then out of nowhere you get this cardamom spice. Creamy vanilla, creamy ice cream and impalpable sugar. On the palate it was marvelous: apple pie, fruit spice, cinnamon and sweet pepper. Red apples and impalpable sugar. Aftertaste was delicious and very long lasting. Hay and very sugary. It is like milk with sugar. Overall, this might be the best speysider i have had in a long time. It was so good i bought a bottle in the shop, and that is particularly a compliment, since i can only bring back 4 bottles of whisky to Ecuador due to custom laws; that being said, in a trip to Scotland you have to be very picky when selecting the only 4 bottles you are bringing back home. My score for this outstanding dram was 94 over 100.