The Royal Fleet of the Danish King Haokon was stationed in in the sheltered bay of Scapa Flow in the 13th century. After First World War 52 German warships were scuttled by their crews in June 1919. During the Second World War a German submarine torpedoed the British battelship HMS Royal Oak in 1939 killing 833 people.

Scapa Distillery was founded by Macfarlane and John T. Townsend (Glasgow) in 1885. Alfred Barnard reported in his account of „The Whisky Distilleries of the United Kingdom and Ireland“:

„This Distillery is the newest in the island, having only been completed in October, 1885. It is two miles from Kirkwall, and situated at the head of Scapa Bay. The country hereabouts is destitute of trees, but much of the land is under cultivation. So striking is the appearance of this treeless country, that a Yankee, who had arrived by the steamer during the night, exclaimed on getting out the next morning, that he had never seen such a "tarnation fine clearin'." But the beautiful sea-scape somewhat compensates for this loss, for sparkling in the bright sunshine are the white sails of ships, and boats manned by crews who know every creek on the coast...“

Only three men operate the distillery (2011). Production capacity is about 1 mio. litres per year, annual production in 2011 was 400.000 litres of spirit.

Distillery Manager: Brian MacAulay (2015)

From April 2015 onwards there will be public access to the distillery.  The visitor centre offers tours through the manually operated distillery and warehouse. The visitor centre will be open seven days per week until the end of September 2015 and then five days per week until Friday 13th November 2015, from 9:30am until 5pm.

Please double-click and thumbnail the photo to open the tour.

Thank you.