Caol Ila 1979 Gentle Noses 28 Year Old / Ark of the Covenant Part 1

This was bottled by Lars-Goran Wiebers, aka "Jack." He is the proprietor of the renowned Jack Wiebers Whisky World retailer in Germany, established in 1996. Since then has released a number of respected independent bottlings under labels such as the Old Train Line, Gentle Noses, The Cross Hill and Auld Distillers Alliance.

The Gentle Noses label was introduced in 2004 and is based on the story of rival families in China called Lee and Foo, who apparently quarelled over who has the better nose. The series pits Jack Wiebers fictional Jack Lee against Jumping Foo in a serie of competitions to sniff out the finest whisky. Each bottle is labelled over the capsule as the selection of one or the other.

This Caol Ila is part one of the Ark of the Covenant (Die Bundeslade) series. A 1979 vintage, it was bottled from a bourbon cask in 2007.

Caol Ila distillery was built in 1846 by Hector Henderson, who was bought out from the venture a little over 10 year later by Bulloch Lade. The blending firm merged with DCL (now Diageo) in 1927, who still run the distillery today. In 1972 the original site was demolished and replaced by a new one. When distilling resumed in 1974, Caol Ila was the largest producer of single malt on the Isle of Islay. Despite this, due to its importance in popular blends such as Johnnie Walker, its single malt brand disappeared under United Distillers, and it was not until 2002 that it would return, when the 12 year old was revived by Diageo. The Flora & Fauna release was well-regarded in the meantime, but it was independent releases like this that gave the best opportunity to sample this much-loved single malt.

This bottle is being sold from the Pat's Whisk(e)y private collection which, numbering in excess of 9,000 bottles and over 2,000 miniatures, is the single largest collection of whisky ever to be brought to auction. Pat's Whisk(e)y is the result of over fifteen years of passion and dedication to the goal of creating one of the most complete libraries of whisky and whiskey ever amassed by an individual collector. It contains bottles from over 150 different Scottish distilleries, as well as bourbon, rare Scotch releases from sought-after independent bottlers in Europe, and whisky from other distilleries across the globe. Whisky Auctioneer is delighted to have partnered with Pat's Whisk(e)y to offer this collection across a number of exclusive and spotlight auctions. For more information, please click here.