Situated on the north side of Brodick Bay this is a new brewery with a visitors centre for the tourists, you don’t actually get into the brewery itself but instead you see the process through glass windows and of course you get to taste the beer produced. It’s a micro brewery which means that it is a small affair so pretty much everything is easily seen without the need to clamber about between the pipes.

The centre is not so high tech as its competitor, the distillery at Lochranza, but is interesting enough all the same and has the advantage of being within walking distance of Brodick Town.

The Brewery produces three main beers – Arran Ale, Arran Dark and Arran Blonde – the latter is the strongest of the beers at 5% and is described as having a Floral Hop and new mown grass aroma with a citric fruit and well balanced figure – I don’t have a clue what all that gibberish means or if they think it will help sell the beer, but I reckon it tasted alright and I could certainly sink a few glasses of the stuff so gets my nod of approval.

Tel 01770 302353

Going back in history Scotland has a long standing tradition of private but nevertheless illegal whisky stills, but these have been shut down by the taxman even although rumours of some are still in existence in the highlands, yet to be found out! Here on Arran though it’s a completely new distillery that has been built at the north end of the Island at Lochranza village and was opened only about five years ago.

The distillery is a fairly small affair but this is balanced with a much larger tourist centre added on the site – clearly they expect tourists to generate a good piece of their income. At first glance I wasn’t impressed, it looked like a run of the mill tourist trap which you could find at many distilleries in Scotland now, the image wasn’t bolstered by the building which turned out to be a fake crofters inn built specially for the centre although once we entered first impressions didn’t hold true. Despite being surrounded by stunning scenery they have built a huge three story waterfall inside the building, which forms the centrepiece of the tour and have a pretty good restaurant in there as well – certainly a bit more than the usual coffee shop.

As is usual on distillery tours you get to try a taste of the whisky at the end of the tour – its called Arran Malt – meaning that its wholly made on the island without interference from other distilleries which is a good thing for quality but not so good for quantity, it takes a long time to produce a bottle of whisky so with only five years under their belt it’ll be a long time yet until we see it on the shelves in the shops back home, They are also producing a cream liqueur which is not so rough for those non-whisky drinkers.