Lagavulin 8 Year

This is a real treat - I found the fairly recent Lagavulin 8 Year on major discount at my local liquor store. It was significantly cheaper than the 16 Year, which isn't common here in Washington DC.  This was created to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the Lagavulin distillery, which is one of my very favorites. It's fairly well known among drinkers of heavily peated Scotch that the younger the age of the liquid, the rougher the smoke tends to be, to the point of being unruly and sometimes unpalatable. Let's see how this turns out... 

Glenmorangie Spios (NAS)

Glenmorangie has experimenting a bit more than most distilleries these days. In the last few years, we've had Scotch that was aged in madeira casks, wine casks, using fancy barley, Grand Cru barrels, casks made from premium slow-growth oak, and so on. Their Prestige Line releases a new interestingly-aged bottle every year, and 2018's release is Spios (Gaelic for "Spice"), which is aged entirely in rye whiskey barrels (!).