Jack Daniels Distillery Tour

The last thing we did before leaving Manchester, Tennessee, was take a tour of the Jack Daniel’s Distillery in nearby Lynchburg. Dan and I have been to many wine tastings, vineyards, and wineries, and a handful of beer breweries, but this was our first tour of a whiskey distillery. Jack Daniel’s authentic Tennessee whiskey is the top-selling American whiskey in the world and all of it is produced in Lynchburg, at this distillery. (Ironically, Lynchburg itself is in a dry county, so the whiskey cannot be purchased at stores or restaurants within Moore County.) Packaged in square bottles, Jack Daniel’s “Black Label” Tennessee whiskey sold 12.5 million cases in 2017, with other brand variations totaling another 2.9 million.

I really enjoyed our tour, and I’m sure a lot of that was because of our very lively tour guide. He was knowledgeable, witty, authentically Tennessean, and took us on a very thorough exploration of the facility, and provided us a dynamic history of Jack Daniels, the man, and a primer on whiskey making. We learned how the mash is made from corn, rye and malted barley distilled in copper stills. We saw the stacks of sugar maple hardwood that are doused in raw unaged whiskey and set ablaze to create charcoal pellets used in the “mellowing” process. We saw the on-site Cave Spring Hollow, a natural spring inside a cave, that draws 800 gallons of water from miles below the earth’s surface every minute, and is the whiskey’s lifeblood. In 1884 Jack Daniels purchased Cave Spring Hollow and its surrounding land for $2,148, which at the time was considered a huge fortune.

Finally, we toured portions of the bottling and packaging facility, and last but definitely not least, we were able to have a Jack Daniel’s tasting experience. Our guide walked us through a flight of five varieties of whiskey, giving us information about the production of each, how long it was aged, instructing us on how to appreciate the aromas, and sip it properly. Ironically, even though you cannot purchase whiskey in stores and restaurants in Lynchburg, you can buy it in “collectible bottles” in the on-site distillery gift shop. How convenient! 

Concert in The Caverns: Tommy Emmanuel

For years Dan and I have been fans of the PBS series Bluegrass Underground, which features music covering the full spectrum of the bluegrass, jamgrass, roots, and Americana genres. The first nine years of the program were recorded before live audiences in the Volcano Room, a cave 333 feet underneath McMinnville, Tennessee, but in 2018 the concert series moved to a new venue, The Caverns, located within the base of Monteagle Mountain near Pelham, Tennessee.

Our travel itinerary for 2018 allowed us to work in the stop in Manchester to catch a concert at The Caverns venue. Although they weren’t taping an episode of Bluegrass Underground the day we were there, we were able to see Tommy Emmanuel, an Australian guitarist, songwriter, and singer whose talent and live performances are among the best we’ve ever seen. We’ve been Tommy fans for years, and have seen him perform a few times before, so we were more than thrilled to be able to see him perform in this setting.

We were not disappointed! Our tickets were a full package deal that included meal vouchers, hats, tee shirts, posters, and a free download of a “best of” Bluegrass Underground music album. The cavern temperatures were very cool, we probably could have dressed a little warmer (we were warned, not a surprise!). While it probably wasn’t any cooler than most caverns we’ve visited, we normally aren’t inside for 2-3 hours, which is long enough to get pretty chilled. 

Tommy is a self-taught musician and has been playing the guitar since he was 4 years old. He traveled and performed with his family for years while he was growing up. He doesn’t read music - he watches, listens, imitates, and then creates his own style of music which is upbeat and high energy, and just all out fun. The show opened with another musician, Jack Pearson, who played electric guitar, and who joined Tommy on a few songs, and another musician who played a mean harmonica.

How exciting it was to actually realize this long time bucket list item!

 Below is a video of Tommy Playing one of his signature pieces:

The Amish Hippie

During one of our exploration days while camped in Manchester, Tennessee, we drove to Monteagle, a very small rural town located on the southern Cumberland Plateau. Like everywhere else in Tennessee, Monteagle was green and lush, and, we later found out, also famous for a treacherous stretch of Interstate 24 that passes through the town. The interstate regularly shuts down in bad weather and in the Jerry Reed Song “The Legend” (the opening track in the film Smokey and the Bandit), Reed tells the story of the Bandit miraculously surviving brake failure on the Monteagle Grade. There is also a song called “Monteagle Grade” by Johnny Cash on the album Boom Chicka Boom.

All claims to fame aside, I found myself laughing out loud when we drove by a shop called “The Amish Hippie”. People who know me know that I’ve always been drawn to all things Hippie, and to all things Amish. But I never, in my wildest imagination, thought there would be one shop that encompassed both concepts under one roof. Of course we had to stop. Of course we had to go in. And of course we took pictures. Spread across three or four separate rooms, this funky, eclectic, quirky shop did indeed carry both Amish related merchandise (homemade jams, woven baskets, soaps, candles), and all things Hippie related (clothes, posters, incense, bags, t-shirts, beads, paraphernalia).

We spent about half an hour taking it all in, bought an Amish Hippie T-shirt as a memento, and tucked this experience into our virtual “unexpected delights found while traveling” file.