One Shot Story of Three Guys in a Field, Somewhere in Scotland

I have no idea who these guys are… and I spent a week with them in Scotland on a brand trip sponsored by Hendrick’s Gin during the summer of 2019.

A “brand trip” like this is intended to showcase a new spirit or product from a liquor company and educate industry professionals to the inner workings of that particular brand. Individuals are selected from different markets around the country or globe, depending on the trip, based on the establishments the brand thinks are best suited to represent and sell their product to you, the consumer. No matter the brand, size of the group, or locale, you can always count on the trip being littered with nerdy cocktail mixologists, high-volume club or chain restaurant bartenders, small-town dive bartenders, wide-eyed and bushy-tailed newcomers, cranky veterans (I prefer “charming curmudgeon” but my staff insists I’m the former), and of course a handful of brand representatives. Sometimes you are lucky enough to know more than half of these people, most of the time it’s one or two, and then there are occasions when you know absolutely no-one. Thankfully there are copious amounts of alcohol which helps make you fast friends.

But because of the copious amounts of alcohol consumed by the wide variety of bartenders trying to impress one another with their ability, but more often inability, to drink a mind altering liquid, you can always count on some, if not all, of the following things on every trip:

A visit to the emergency room.
A visit to, and then from, jail.
A bus:
– That will act like a fraternity/sorority house with zero rules, “Who wants another shot of rum at 9am?”
– That will inevitably break down.
– That will be overslept for.
– That will leave someone behind.
– That will take someone(s) to the wrong location.
A boat can also do these things.
And so can an airplane.
Endless distillery tours. Sounds fun, I know, but once you’ve seen like three distilleries you’ve literally seen them all. Fermentation tanks, stills, extractors, rick houses, and science labs all generally look the same from Kentucky to Thailand.
Hangovers. Someone announces theirs is the “worst in the history of hangovers,” declares it a “crime against humanity,” that the Geneva Conventions should recognize it as a form of torture, and acts like a baby for the better part of the day. Better go ahead and have that 9am shot of rum, pal.
The drama, oh the drama, night after night after night of people sleeping with each other and then awkwardly trying to avoid each other the next day.
Being escorted from one locale to another by armed guards.
Buying drugs from a local crime family.
Someone will lose their passport. Always.

Now, that being said, there’s also an equal amount of truly rewarding and unforgettable moments and events that happen:

Gambling on Lucha Libra matches in Guadalajara.
Catching sea urchin with your bare hands and eating it right in the water.
Sharing a house on a Caribbean island with five of your closest friends and drinking rosé in the ocean until sunrise.
Tasting tequila and mezcal that no one else in the world will ever taste again.
Competing in cocktails competitions.
Winning said cocktail competitions.
Eating dinner in a cave.
The drama, oh the drama, night after night after night of people sleeping with each other and then awkwardly trying to avoid each other the next day.
Off-roading a Jeep in the hills of Mexico before lunch in a field of agave just before harvest.
Buying drugs from a local crime family.
Just being somewhere new for the very first time, be it domestic or foreign, is always an exhilarating.
And truly making new friends…I met one of my closest friends on one of these trips to Martinique.

Hendricks had reached out to me and billed this particular trip as less of a free-for-all party and insisted that they had far more planned than just drinking gin, so despite my initial hesitation I agreed.

For reasons still unknown to me I was flown into Glasgow two days before the rest of the group was set to arrive. I spent that entire time walking the city, exploring the Kelvingrove museum, napping in the Necropolis, drinking strange scotch in the famous Pot Still bar, and stuffing my belly with more blood sausage and haggis than anyone ever should in a 48 hour period.

Once the group arrived we saw the incredible Hendrick’s Gin palace in the coastal town of Girvan; imagine if Willy Wonka hired William van Alen to design a distillery for the sole purpose of making gin. We got a private curling lesson from an Olympic medalist…because…there’s a giant rock island off the coast of Girvan called the Ailsa Craig which is the exclusive producer of curling stones for the Olympics. We went to Edinburgh for a tour of the castle and had a full on spa day at our resort. And of course, we drank gin.

We glamped (you know, glamorous camping?) in a field out in the middle of nowhere amongst some old ruins where we stayed up all night celebrating the summer solstice and the release of the new expression of Hendrick’s called “Midsummer Solstice.” We feasted on giant legs of meat at giant tables and drank from giant steins full of magical gin elixir and howled at the moon. We played Kubb (an ancient viking lawn game), danced around the fire, and wondered off into the woods to act like members of a Shakespearian troupe. And as the moon was setting and the sun was beginning to say hello, there were just a few of us left standing, drinking gin, commiserating about the pros and cons of bartending (I know, this sounds like fun), and declaring we would remain friends for life. And in that moment I took this picture with my Leica M6, a 28mm Elmarit, and Portra 800. And indeed they were right, this particular trip was unlike any I had ever been on.

And once I got the roll of film developed I realized I still had no idea who the fuck these three guys were.

You can find more of my ramblings on Instagram or my website.

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