All aboard! Local craft tours is your ticket to Seattle’s new spirits craze.

The next time your friends are in town and ask you for suggestions on sites to see, you might want to go with them. You can skip the Space Needle and Duck Tour, but you’ll want to check out the Local Craft Tours, a new tourist attraction that takes guests to the various local craft distilleries of Seattle.

Hop into the Local Craft Tours’ Mercedes Sprinter and get ready for an afternoon of spirit sampling and treats from local artisan chefs. Along the way you’ll receive a behind the scenes look into the world of craft distilling, meet the master distillers, and here their stories that go back as far as the old country.

How did we get here? Prior to 2008, there was just one distillery in the state of Washington — Spokane-based Dry Fly Distilling. Then, state legislation allowed the hard-alcohol industry to develop and since then, distilleries like Fremont Mischief, Sodo Spirits, Rain City Spirits, and 2bar Spirits have created a local industry that contributes to the local economy. In addition to attracting tourists, the craft distillers are required to source most of their raw products from Washington state, which helps local farmers.

Call it a comeback and a tribute. Washington state’s reputation with liquor isn’t new. During the American Prohibition, Roy Olmstead, a former lieutenant in the Seattle Police Department, was one of the most successful and best-known bootleggers in the Pacific Northwest. Bootlegging was his part-time job while he was with the police department. After he got caught and fired from the police department he began illegally importing and distributing alcohol from Canada as a full-time job.

You’ll learn bits of Washington’s speakeasy culture and history from your swanky dressed tour guides; local bartenders, Craig Krueger and Tara Fuller, who took notice of the growing industry and launched Local Craft Tours this spring.

The tour also offers a private or customized Parlor Room Tour where they can schedule to pick you up and drop you off at a specific location you choose. You also have the option of designing your own experience around a specific spirit.

For more information and booking, visit localcrafttours.com.