Hellyers Road Aged 22 Years, 21 Years & 12 Years (Tasted #702 - 704)

Happy New Year! Hope you all managed to get some downtime over the holiday period (hopefully with a dram or two in hand).

We're back into it for 2026, kicking off where we left off, with a few more Australian whiskies...

My two trips to Tassie last year (after a 17 year absence) gave me a great opportunity to get back into the Aussie whisky scene I’d been away from for so long - to try a bunch of new distilleries, rediscover old ones, and to connect and re-connect with some great whisky folk in Tassie.

One of those people was Mark from Whisky is my Jam - arguably one of the most knowledgable, passionate and connected people in all of Tasmanian whisky, and also a genuinely great bloke.

On a few occasions Mark took me through a range of Tassie whiskies - some I was experiencing for the first time, and some I hadn't tried in over a decade. In the latter camp was Hellyers Road, which in a "full circle" kind of moment was actually the very first two whiskies I ever wrote about on this blog (over 13 years ago)!

Mark put me in touch with David from Sales & Promotions at the distillery (someone I'd been following on IG for years), who was kind enough to send me a few well-aged samples to re-acquaint myself further. Included were:

• American Oak Aged 22 Years cask #2325.03 (80 bottles, full maturation, 56.5% ABV)
• World Whiskies Awards 2025 Best Australian Single Malt winner Peated Cask Finish Aged 21 Years Cask #20F05C01 (301 bottles, 17 years in ex-Bourbon then 4 years in an ex-peated Hellyers Road cask, 52.5% ABV)
• World Whiskies Awards 2022 Best Australian Single Malt winner American Oak Aged 12 Years (fully matured in 1st Fill ex-Bourbon casks, 46.2%)

Let's dig in...

 

Hellyers Road American Oak Aged 22 Years (Cask #2325.03) (56.5% ABV, Single Malt, 22yo, 1 of 80 bottles, Tasmania, Australia, $1,450AUD)
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Colour: Amber sunset.

Nose: Big and complex - orange / citrus notes and perfume, with some slight hints of peach, treacle and oak.

Palate: Immediate zesty orange peel, followed up by whole orange slices. Some oak spice & marmalade, ginger, and a slight grassy herbaceousness. It's complex, and it all works well. 

Finish: Long, marmalade, stone fruits.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 92/100 (Martin). 

Hellyers Road Peated Cask Finish Aged 21 Years (Cask #20F05C01) (52.5% ABV, Single Malt, 21yo, 1 of 301 bottles, Tasmania, Australia, $1,350AUD)
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Colour: Golden sunset

Nose: Keeps the citrus oil and perfume of the 22yo, but with a subtle underlying campfire note, and more tropical notes (passionfruit mostly).

Palate: The peat smoke is more pronounced on the palate, but the passionfruit and oranges (whole) are there too, in perfect harmony.

Finish: Residual BBQ smoky meatiness, with some final orange zest. Long and lingering.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 92/100 (Martin). Peated cask finishes sometimes don't work too well, but I'm glad to say in this case it works very nicely.

 

Hellyers Road American Oak Aged 12 Years (46.2% ABV, Single Malt, 12yo, Tasmania, Australia, $260AUD)
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Colour: Light golden sunset.

Nose: Bubblegum and Juicyfruit, orange oil, oaked passionfruit

Palate: Follows the nose, with big citrus oil notes, passionfruit, chocolate orange, hints of cinnamon, strawberries and a slight savoury note.

Finish: Long, with a lovely citrus zest that lingers.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 89/100 (Martin). Complex and tasting - wonderful to see how far the spirit has come over the years.

It was great to revisit the distillery that I kicked off this blog with all those years ago, and even better to see the spirit come so far in that time. Thanks Mark for the intro and David for the generous samples.

Cheers,

Martin.

Bowmore 1989 Port Cask Matured 23yo [Tasted #590]

As we approach 10 Years of TimeforWhisky.com in just over a week (and start the "Epic 10" posts from tomorrow), I've been reflecting on some transformative drams I've encountered along the way - those which, despite several years & changing preferences, I still find myself gravitating back to.

One of those is Bowmore's 23 Year Old "Port Cask Matured" from 1989. Released in 2013 as a 12,000 bottle run, this whisky fascinated me as it spent all 23 years in a port casks. Port finishes aren't all that rare, but entire maturation in Port casks (and for a full 23 years) is pretty rare for a Scotch whisky. 

I was intrigued, and (as a lover of most Port-matured whisky), my first taste in 2014 had me hooked. After trying it again at the 2015 Hong Kong launch of Bowmore Mizunara, I decided I needed a bottle, and another, and so on... (I even drank it the day my first son was born).

As whisky tends to do, it got more expensive and harder to come by, so when I bought my last bottle around 2016/2017, I just sort of held on to it...keeping it in the back of the cupboard, waiting for the "right day" to open it...

...which came along just last week, when I arranged a large 'BYOB" whisky gathering dinner (20 people, 40+ bottles...) and decided I'd bring this along. Of course the big question was, after so many years, was it as good as I remembered...?

Bowmore 1989 "Port Cask Matured" 23yo (50.8% ABV, 23yo, 1 of 12,000 bottles, Islay, Scotland)

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Colour: Golden copper

Nose: Rich coffee grounds steeped in toffee, leather journals, cherry pie, with the slightest hints of sea air.

Palate: Follows the nose - creamy and rich, big berry notes, lots of plums, a hint of juicy oak. There's a slightly tangy BBQ note, but for the most part the peat smoke is fairly muted. It's the casks that take over here - but thankfully, they shine.

Finish: Long, slightly drying, with residual hints of plum (then salted plum), coffee grounds and rich cherries.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale): 93/100. Still the dram I remember. Still the dram I love.

Cheers,

Martin.

Tasted #326 - 328: Three single cask GlenDronachs from Batch 11

Batch 14 of GlenDronach's excellent single cask releases may have just been released, but we're stepping back a little with this post - to January 2015's Batch 11. 

(For comparison, we'll have tasting notes on three of the recent Batch 14 releases - Oloroso Sherry Butt releases of course - in a few weeks. In particular, this 23yo, this 24yo and this 24yo.) 

These three whiskies came from a PX Sherry Puncheon (1990 Cask #1162), an Oloroso Sherry Puncheon (1995 Cask #4941) and my personal favourite - an Oloroso Sherry Butt (1994 Cask #54). Whilst I'd love to have full bottles of these, GlenDronach's single casks have been getting harder and harder to get a hold of lately, especially the official "Batch" releases from the distillery. I'm still managing to get a hold of a reasonable amount of "private" single casks - casks bottled for whisky shows, clubs, events etc.. (mostly from Taiwan and Japan), but the official "Batches" seem to sell out quicker and quicker every year.

Somewhat easier to get a hold of though are the 30mL sample drams Master of Malt sell via their "Drinks by the Dram" service...which is how I ended up tasting these...

GlenDronach Single Cask Batch 11 Cask #1162 1990 24 Year Old (52.9% ABV, 24yo, Single Malt from an ex-PX Sherry puncheon, Speyside, Scotland, was £104.96ex-VAT but no longer available)

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Colour: Dark mocha-copper.

Nose: Initially a little hot. Candied peanuts, raisins, lots of chocolate, hints of tobacco leaves and even a little saltiness.

Palate: There's definitely some PX sweetness here. Plenty of rich, berry-sherry notes, but overlaid with a big sugary/confectionary-like sweetness hit. Cigars, sea air, salted caramel. Oak. Water tones down the sweetness and brings out some tobacco notes.

Finish: Long. Coffee grounds, with a salty astringency. At the very end there's a reasonable amount f tannins. Wither water, a little more earthy.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale):  92/100. A very good whisky, but not as well balanced (especially when it comes to the oak) as the others.

GlenDronach Single Cask Batch 11 Cask #54 1994 20 Year Old (56.6% ABV, 20yo, Single Malt from an ex-Oloroso Sherry butt, Speyside, Scotland, was £79.96ex-VAT but no longer available)

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Colour: Treacle, maple syrup copper.

Nose: Toffee, demerara sugar, and a lot of spice - cloves. There's also a freshness, some nutmeg, and a lot of citrus oil - like a freshly expressed orange peel.

Palate: This is just all kinds of trademark GlenDronach - big rich juicy complex sherry. There's also hints of bacon, maple syrup, caramel, stewed berries and rich, warm cherry pie.

Finish: Long (LONG!), spicy-sweet, with a residual sweet treacle note that balances perfectly with hints of oak.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale):  94/100. Just a wonderful whisky.

GlenDronach Single Cask Batch 11 Cask #4941 1995 19 Year Old (57% ABV, 19yo, Single Malt from an ex-Oloroso Sherry puncheon, Speyside, Scotland, was £75.79ex-VAT but no longer available)

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Colour: Dark amber-copper (or as some would say - "correct").

Nose: Earthy at first. Then varnish/furniture polish, leather, tobacco and Brazil nuts. Beautiful nose. With water it becomes a little more earthy, a little more dusty.

Palate: Initially citrus-sweet, then moving onto rich mocha caramel. Sweeter and spicier than the nose, with hardly any of the furniture polish / leather from the nose. Water does add a little bit of those characteristics though.

Finish: Long, citrus-y and warming. Slight tannic astringency, which vanishes after a few drops of water.

Rating (on my very non-scientific scale):  92/100. A very nice whisky but I wish the palate was as good as the nose suggested.


Cheers,
Martin.