Experiences / Distillery Tour & Tasting
Exclusive access to our production area — then taste every rum we make.
The Rumhuys Distillery Tour & Tasting gives you access that our regular bar guests don't get — a guided walk through the production area where our rums are blended, bottled and prepared for release. This is not a staged visitor experience. It is the actual working space, and the tour reflects that.
After the production area, you return to the blending bar for a guided tasting of all five house blends — each one explained in the context of what you've just seen. By the end you will understand exactly what is in your glass and why it tastes the way it does.
Most visitors to Rumhuys see the bar. On this tour, you go further. The production area is where the actual work of blending happens — where base spirits are received, tested and measured, where flavour components are prepared and combined, and where finished batches are assessed before bottling.
Your guide will walk you through each station:
The production area is not normally open to the public. Access is limited to tour groups of no more than 12 guests at a time to preserve the working environment and the integrity of open batches. This is a genuine behind-the-scenes experience — not a replica or a recreation.
Before you taste the five blends, the tour gives you the foundation to actually understand them. All Rumhuys rums start from the same base: pure agricultural rum — rhum agricole — made from fresh sugarcane juice, not molasses.
Most rum in the world is made from molasses, the dark syrup left over after sugar has been extracted from cane. It is a by-product — perfectly functional, but already stripped of much of the cane's natural aromatic character. Agricultural rum skips that step entirely. The fresh cane juice goes straight from the mill to the fermentation tank, carrying with it the mineral character of the soil, the freshness of the harvest, and the full aromatic potential of the plant.
The difference is audible in the glass before it even reaches your lips — agricultural rum has a complexity on the nose that molasses-based rum rarely achieves, even with years of oak ageing.
Fresh cane juice ferments for 48 to 72 hours in our tanks — nearly twice the industry standard. This is not inefficiency. It is a deliberate choice. Slow fermentation allows the natural yeasts to build the full aromatic complexity of the spirit rather than simply racing to convert sugar into alcohol. The difference between a 24-hour fermentation and a 72-hour fermentation is not subtle. It is the difference between a neutral spirit and rum with a genuine story.
After fermentation, the liquid passes through copper column stills. Copper is the preferred material for rum distillation because it actively reacts with sulphur compounds in the distillate, removing them and allowing the aromatic esters to express themselves fully. A slower distillation, run at lower temperatures, extracts more of those aromatic molecules. Our base spirit exits the still at between 74 and 80% alcohol — rich, complex, and already characterful before any flavouring begins.
Reduction and rest come first: the distillate is brought down slowly with pure natural water and given time to integrate before any blending begins. At that point the rum master works with our library of natural extractions — macerated spices, fruit preparations, botanical tinctures — to build the profiles you are about to taste. Nothing artificial. Nothing synthesised. Every flavour in every bottle has a physical ingredient behind it, most of which you will have seen in the production area before you sit down to taste.
After the production tour, you take your seat at the blending bar. Five pours. Five stories from Sint Maarten.
Named for Sint Maarten's famous salt ponds — the white gold that defined the island's economy for centuries. This is the base spirit with nothing added: clean, mineral and precise. Tasting it first gives you the foundation against which every other blend is built.
Coconut, mango, tropical fruit — the scents of a Caribbean market on a Saturday morning. Made with natural fruit extractions macerated from real ingredients. Light, bright and honest about what it is.
Sint Maarten is the only island shared by two sovereign nations with no border fence between them. This blend acknowledges both sides — French aromatic complexity on one side, Dutch directness on the other. Spiced, balanced and slightly transgressive.
Named after the donkey that walked in circles to power the old sugarcane mills before steam arrived. Chocolate and roasted hazelnut — a rum built for slow sipping. The production process for this blend is one of the most labour-intensive in our range.
These waters were pirate territory long before they were cruise territory. Bold Caribbean spices — cinnamon, clove, vanilla and more — in a rum that carries the full weight of that history. The most assertive blend in our range.
A personalised tasting card with notes on all five blends, the story behind each one, and cocktail suggestions. Plus a 10% discount on any bottle purchased on the day. Want to go further? The Distillery Tour combines naturally with the Make Your Own Rum Workshop — book both and spend a full afternoon at Rumhuys.
You get a guided walk through the working production area — the spirit storage, flavouring lab, blending station, bottling area, and quality control process. This area is not open during regular bar service. Access is limited to tour groups of 12 or fewer to preserve the working environment.
Yes. The tour runs daily when cruise ships are in port and fits comfortably within a 2–3 hour port stop. Rumhuys is a 5-minute walk from the cruise terminal in Philipsburg — no transport needed.
Yes — this is our most popular combination. The tour gives you the context; the workshop lets you apply it. Start with the production tour and tasting, then move straight into blending your own rum. Total time around 2 hours. Mention it when booking and we will schedule both back to back.
The production area tour is limited to 12 guests per session to preserve the working environment. For larger groups, we run consecutive sessions. Contact us when booking and we will arrange accordingly.
Advance booking is strongly recommended for the production tour due to the 12-person limit. Walk-ins are accommodated when space allows, but the tour fills quickly on busy port days. Book at least 24 hours ahead to guarantee your session.
Rhum agricole is rum made from fresh sugarcane juice rather than molasses. It produces a more aromatic, complex spirit that expresses the terroir of the cane it comes from. All Rumhuys base spirits are agricultural rum. The production tour explains exactly why this matters — and you taste the proof afterwards.