ISLAND LIFE

He’s the Glaswegian Taswegian. Robbie Gilligan moved from Scotland to Tasmania in 2014 for his two loves: his girlfriend at the time, Emma, and also for our whisky — specifically for Lark whisky. He tried Lark for the first time in January 2012 with his then potential father-in-law Patrick on a 10-day holiday to see where Emma came from.

“Honest to God it was the best whisky I had ever tasted,” Gilligan tells TasWeekend.

“I sat down and they put four different whiskies in front of me. They were amazing and not like any other kind of whisky I had ever smelled. They were big and bold and fruity and one was a caramel monster. They coated my mouth and the taste was lingering. It was just holding all this beautiful flavour. It was phenomenal.”

The quality was so impressive, it silenced the chatty Scotsman who thought to himself: “I could get used to this.”

The then 34-year-old made friends with Bill Lark on that fateful whisky tasting day, and says he now looks up to him as a father.

His strong Scottish accent helped him secure a job behind the bar at Lark, and later he immersed himself in every part of the business to learn it all.

“Bill said to me ‘you need to walk the walk and talk the talk and know exactly what you are talking about’, so I rolled up my sleeves and soaked up all the information like a sponge.”

Gilligan and Emma now run the Old Kempton Distillery, which houses a fully stocked cellar door and whisky tasting rooms, and he is president of the Tasmanian Whisky Spirits Association.

“Tasmanian whisky is some of the best whisky in the world and could easily match the best from Scotland and America and Japan,” Gilligan says.

Tasmanian Whisky Week runs from Monday, August 12, to August 18. Visit @tasmanian.whisky.week