Bunnahabhain and other fun things

We are officially in the hills of Scotland. After an early call this morning, and a confusing boarding (backing onto) of the ferry, we arrived on the Isle of Islay. Drove around and saw lots of sheep, some new birds and some fun small small teeny tiny villages, we ended up at our first distillery, which happened to be Bowemore, the first distillery on the island! We enjoyed generous complimentary tasters, except for James who was our DD for most of the day. We enjoyed the accents and listened to Gaelic radio without understanding a word of the DJ. Next stop, Laguvulin, and we got an amazing tour from Marjorie. Got to see and smell the varying stages of the whisky distilling process, and learn how they smoke the malt with peat from the island. We can see the peat bogs as we drive along, and smell it burning in the distilleries and some homes use it in their fireplaces too.
Next stop Laphroig, Jeff's favorite. We tasted some, and got to hike out to "his" plot of land as he is a "Friend of Laphroig" and they mark out his 1x1 square foot plot, then we got to wear boots and go tromp through the peat bog to place a little mini American flag. Jeff was skipping with excitement through this, as he had been waiting to do this for 3 years. Stopped in quickly at Ardbeg and did a small tasting, then went back to Bowemore as it had our favorite scotch from today that we aren't able to get in the States.
Today's weather was unusually beautiful, all the locals are telling us how strange it is to see blue sky and sunshine. We have certainly enjoyed it, as the drives through the fields and along the water have been amazing.
Staying at a cute little cottage B&B, and about to head to dinner where our B&B owner phoned his friend to get us a reservation!
Dinner was amazing! The only dinner place nearby that is worth it, at another hotel. They have a restaurant and bar, and this tiny place has over 250 malt whiskies available. Adorable and full of character, we enjoyed some local scallops and lamb and venison. Chatted with an older couple from England and they told us about the flock of 30,000 geese that came down on the North wind from Iceland last week, and we will go look for them on the nature preserve at the north end of the island tomorrow, find some more distilleries, hop over to the Isle of Jura with 150 people and 5000 deer. :)
Oh, and this eve James and Jeff were sheepdogs and herded the famililys sheep towards me in their field so I got to see them hysterically running and bleating and jumping all over the place. I got my sheep pictures!