I attended on the Friday, having first been to the Good Food show.
Which was rather dull. So much so that we covered all we wanted to in about
45mins, then just camped out and did a bit of web surfing on the iPod Touch via their free wifi. At least I assume it was free. It was certainly insecure..!Anyway, this being my first Whisky Live I wasn't quite sure what to expect. Initially I was a bit disappointed at the size of the show - it didn't seem like there were very many exhibitors. However this impression proved to be (mostly) false, as the ones that were there were very good generally. I was a tad disappointed in the Ardbeg stand as they only appeared to have the standard 10yo, Uigeadail and Airigh Nam Beist, but I didn't look too closely as I'm fairly familiar with Ardbeg's stuff so I might have been wrong.
You were given a free Glencairn tasting glass (engraved with 'Whisky Live') and there was plenty of free water to hand. And comfy seats. Bliss.
We came back with two Benriach's (who really seem to be a rising star at the moment), a Benromach peated, a Balblair '79 (get it while you can, it's not made anymore), and a Glengoyne 12CS. If you add in the whiskies we got from other places in Scotland while we were there then you can add an Ardbeg Lord of the Isles (the most expensive whisky I've ever bought at 125UKP), a Talisker 25yo (not far behind!), a HP15 (simply because I like it), a Glenkinchie double matured (interesting, but doesn't quite work for me), and a Whisky Shop own bottling of a 15yo CS Springbank which is just lovely - light, sweet, almost tingly on your tongue. Reminded me of a sherbet lemon for some reason..!
Oh, and a PC6. That really is coming on nicely. It's like being hit full in the face with a big bunch of seaweed, but in a good way. It's also a bit more available than the PC5 was, so getting hold of it shouldn't be too hard, at least in the UK.
What I like about the show is that it gives you the chance to sample whiskies that you might not have wanted to risk getting an entire bottle of. In addition, although you're only given five vouchers to exchange for drams (although some whiskies require more than a single voucher) a lot of the stands will let you have a sneaky extra dram if you appear genuinly interested. It was this that made us buy two Benriachs instead of just the one, so my thanks to the lady who served us.
All in all I loved it and will certainly be going next year, situation allowing.
Jim