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Navigating the Bourbon Trail

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After my trip to Tennessee’s Whiskey Country , it was just a short distance to the Kentucky Bourbon Trail . Between the incredibly green Bluegrass and the stables of horses that remind you that this is Derby Country, there are a host of distilleries waiting for visitors. There are six distilleries on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail – Jim Beam, Maker’s Mark, Woodford Reserve, Heaven Hill, Wild Turkey and Four Roses. On this trip I got to visit the first three. They were very different, both in the experience and in the bourbon they produced. All bourbon is whiskey, but not all whisky is bourbon. There are actually strict rules on what makes whiskey a bourbon, including; Bourbon’s grain mixture must be at least 51% corn.; Bourbon must be distilled to no more than 80% alcohol; Bourbon must be aged in charred oak barrels which are new; Bourbon is not run through a charcoal filter like whiskey. The first stop in Kentucky for me was Woodford Reserve . It was appropriate since I had hors