Rum in Barbados: Mount Gay, St Nicholas Abbey and Foursquare

About Rum in Barbados: Mount Gay, St Nicholas Abbey and Foursquare

By the ULTIMATE Barbados Editorial Team

Barbados and rum go back a long way, and you can taste the story at the places that make it, from a working distillery in the far north to a Jacobean plantation house and a family distillery in St. Philip.

Mount Gay in St. Lucy

Mount Gay dates its story to 1703, and its historic distillery tours take you onto that original landscape in St. Lucy, in the far north, through a fully working distillery. Choose the two-hour Distillery Tour (from US$60 on Mount Gay’s booking page), the three-hour Discovery Experience or the Storied Dinner Tour. The distillery is open from Monday to Saturday, 10am to 4.30pm, and children are not allowed.

The visitor centre

Mount Gay’s visitor centre is at Brandons, on the Spring Garden Highway just outside Bridgetown, for the Signature Tasting Tour, a cocktail workshop and a lunch and rum tasting. Children may join the Signature Tasting Tour and the lunch experience only. Taxi drivers sometimes confuse the two sites, so tell yours which one you want.

Mount Gay’s distillery tours take you onto the landscape where the story began, in 1703.

St Nicholas Abbey

On Cherry Tree Hill in St. Peter, St Nicholas Abbey was built in 1658 and is one of only three Jacobean great houses in the Western Hemisphere. Restored as a working plantation, it makes its own single-cask rums, and the tour covers the great house, gardens, a small museum, the factory, the distillery, a short film from around 1930 and a tasting. On select days the owner, Larry Warren, leads a private Rum Experience Tour, and the estate’s heritage railway runs on its own line.

Foursquare

Foursquare, the family-owned distillery of R.L. Seale & Co. in St. Philip, sits on a former sugar plantation, and Visit Barbados lists its heritage park and folk museum. It has no working website, and independent guides say the distillery is not generally open to visitors, so call before you go.

Rum shops

For the everyday side of Barbadian rum, stop at a rum shop, the island’s local bars, where people meet for a drink and dominoes. John Moore Bar on the seafront at Weston and the Village Bar at Lemon Arbour in St. John are two to start with.

Good to know

Book distillery tours ahead, and don’t drive afterwards: take a taxi or join a tour. Look out for the Barbados Food & Rum Festival, which has its own Visit Barbados listing; check this year’s dates.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with Rum in Barbados: Mount Gay, St Nicholas Abbey and Foursquare before you go.