Number 2 in the countdown to 300. After a rocky start I am entering 14.3 with a degree of trepidation… wine casks, again! But, second fill. Maybe this one will figure itself out before all hope is lost. I guess I am about to find out. N: Oh, hello. Ever walked along the coast, stony beach underfoot, sea breeze whipping in, warm fresh pastry in hand. I don’t think I ever have (seagulls would have that pastry in seconds). But damn, I’m close to being there in spirit. Vanilla, toasty oak barrels and grist, briny-salty air, and a danish pastry with that little glazed fruit compote in the middle (pear, apple, mango?). There is also a curious waxiness to this nose, and it’s good. The peat here is gentle, restrained and quite floral, but a spectre of sulphur is also there. P: Wow, it’s huge. Cured beef with demerara glaze, oatmeal with rich creamy milk and churned honey. Salted caramel and toffee apples. Tobacco leaf, ash and salt, aniseed and toasted nuts. I may be wrong, but the palate feels simple, approachable, and yet; monstrous. This is poised and authoritative, it knows what it is about. F: Long. cool dry smoke, some menthol, creosote, brine. Black tea, and maybe fresh blackcurrant at the last. Two drops of water, a swirl, and time to rest. The result is wonderful. The nose warms towards BBQ but slightly mutes and waxiness turns oily. The palate loses and gains nothing in flavour, but it extends each flavour drawing wider arcs and bleeding more subtly into one another. The finish melds into a firm powerful teashop affair. I have at this point forgotten that this was a wine cask or a bourbon cask. These elements are clearly present in the nose, that much should be apparent from the notes I have ascertained. But the palate and finish feel driven by the peat and the distillate, which is, to me at least; what it seems Octomores should be striving for. Distiller whisky taste #299 [Pictured here with a lovely ***** of spodumene pegmatite from Pilgongoora in the Pilbara of Western Australia. This pegmatite is ~2.8 billion years old and formed as dykes between 0.5 to 80 m wide, 50-1500 m long and up to 400 m thick, intruding into an ~3.2 billion year old continental rift. These dykes, thanks to their endowment with huge spodumene crystals and platy lepidolite micas, makes them one of the worlds largest hard rock lithium sources; also, really pretty.] Bruichladdich running scores Classic Laddie: 4/5 Bruichladdich 18 re/define: 4.75/5 Black Art 10.1 29 y/o: 5/5 Port Charlotte 10: 4.5/5 Port Charlotte CC:01: 5/5 Octomore 14.1: 4/5 Octomore 14.2: 2.75/5 Octomore 14.3: 4.25/5