This was my fourth Virtual Distillery Tour (VDT#4) and my first ever Japanese distillery tour of any kind. The Kyoto Distillery makes a unique, or so they claim, Japanese Dry Gin I have never seen or tried called Ki No Bi (insert you own Star Wars joke here….).
I found the virtual technology a little confusing and clunky but in effect it allows you guide yourself through the laboratory, bottling room and distillery and will share some basic info if you click on certain points like still size and water source…. but nothing super-geeky. On the website there is also a series of videos, mostly product promotions, but a 3:15 min Youtube video that tells you a little more about the name Ki No Bi, shows distillery construction, shares some facts about the locally sourced botanicals used and even shows some production. All in all, when you take the combination of virtual tour and the video, you end up with probably the most informative VDT so far and as an added bonus there a few Distillery Bingo words like "locally sourced", "famed fushimi water" and “artisinal” thrown in the video as well. Overall I would say it is like the Tokyo Metro system, very good but tricky to navigate.
https://kyotodistillery.jp/en-GB/virtualdistillerytour/
What is this: https://www.somanywhiskies.com/item/894-distillery-tours-from-my-couch-1
