The Kentucky Bourbon Trail in 2026 is one trail, not two, and it has no paper passport. The old main trail and the Craft Tour merged on July 8, 2024, the stamp booklet was retired after July 1, 2025, and trip planning now happens in a free online tool called Build Your Own Bourbon Trail. From Bardstown you can reach 12 official stops in the trail’s Bardstown Region, most within 35 minutes of Court Square, plus Willett, which is not a member but belongs on your list anyway.
What changed, in order
If you last did the trail with a passport in your glovebox, a lot has moved.
| When | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1999 | The Kentucky Distillers’ Association creates the Kentucky Bourbon Trail with seven distilleries |
| October 2012 | The Craft Tour launches for small producers |
| August 2018 | An official welcome center opens at Louisville’s Frazier History Museum |
| July 8, 2024 | Main trail (18 stops) and Craft Tour (28) merge into one trail of 46 distilleries |
| July 1, 2025 | Paper Passport & Field Guide retired |
| 2025 | 2.7 million visits; 11 new destinations; “nearly 70” participating distilleries |
The official field guide page confirms “the thoughtful decision to retire the Passport & Field Guide after July 1, 2025.” Whisky Advocate’s report on the merger spelled out the transition: passports registered before July 1, 2024 were honored for one more year, and then the program ended. So you can stop hunting for stamps. Any older guide that tells you to pick up a “Craft Tour passport” is out of date.
How Build Your Own Bourbon Trail works
The replacement is a free online trip builder on kybourbontrail.com. You pick distilleries and experiences, and it layers in drive times, dining and lodging and lets you save and share an itinerary. The trail organizes stops into regions, and Bardstown anchors its own.
Two honest caveats. First, the planner is a planning tool, not a booking engine: you still reserve each tour on the distillery’s own site, through whatever system it uses. Second, it only includes trail members. Willett, one of the best tours in Bardstown, is not a member, so add it yourself.
The trail’s own figures show why planning matters: 2.7 million visits in 2025, level with 2024’s record, from all 50 states and more than 20 countries, according to its 2025 visitation release. Popular slots go fast in fall.
The Bardstown Region stops, with drive times
The Bardstown Region trip planner lists 12 stops. Here they are with drive times from Court Square (routing minimums, so add 10 to 20 percent) and what to know in 2026.
| Stop | Where | From Court Square | 2026 notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chicken Cock Circa 1856 | Downtown | Walk | The only trail stop you can walk to; open evenings |
| Heaven Hill Bourbon Experience | Bardstown | Short drive | New Springs distillery tour by shuttle only |
| Bardstown Bourbon Co. | Bardstown | Short drive | No tours Monday or Tuesday |
| Lux Row Distillers | Bardstown | Short drive | Distilling paused since May 2026; tours continue |
| Preservation Distillery | Bardstown | Short drive | Farm setting, open Sundays from 9:30 |
| Four Roses Warehouse & Bottling | Cox’s Creek | 12 mi, 18 min | Free walk-in; closed Mon-Tue |
| Jim Beam | Clermont | 15.5 mi, 24 min | Main plant paused for 2026; tours open |
| Log Still | Gethsemane | About 20-25 min | On-site B&B and concerts |
| Maker’s Mark | Loretto | 21 mi, 34 min | Dip your own bottle |
| Limestone Branch | Lebanon | 28 mi, 34 min | Tue-Sat; distilling paused |
| Kentucky Cooperage | Lebanon | Lebanon area, about 35 min | Barrel-making; confirm tour days directly |
| Boundary Oak | Radcliff | 50-60 min | $15 walk-in tour and tasting |
The regional planner also teased a WhistlePig distillery “coming soon” for spring 2026, but its location and opening had not been confirmed by late September, so do not build a day around it.
The two famous names you won’t find on it
Willett is the big surprise. Its hilltop distillery and copper pot still draw some of the best reviews in town, yet it is not a Kentucky Bourbon Trail member. Book it separately; our Willett guide covers how.
Barton 1792 is the other. It is a working distillery with a huge warehouse campus in town, but public tours and the gift shop ended on June 30, 2022. Some older guides still promise free tours. They are wrong; see our page on Barton 1792 and what to do instead.
Rules of the road
A few things the trail and the distilleries ask of every visitor:
- One tour per distillery per day. Willett’s site notes that under state law, “guests may only participate in one tour experience per day.” Plan a second visit for another day rather than stacking two tours at one stop.
- Bring a government photo ID. Tastings are 21+ everywhere.
- Budget about 1.5 hours per distillery for tour, tasting and shop, then add driving. Three stops is a full day.
- Name a designated driver or hire one. The trail lists official transportation partners, and Heaven Hill runs a designated-driver program. Our tours and transportation guide sorts out who serves Bardstown.
How to build a trail trip from Bardstown
Bardstown works as a hub because the stops fan out in three directions, each a natural day:
- North and west: Jim Beam, Bernheim Forest and Four Roses Cox’s Creek.
- Southeast: Maker’s Mark and Limestone Branch in Marion County.
- In town and south: Heaven Hill, Bardstown Bourbon Co., Lux Row, Preservation, Log Still, and Willett off the trail.
That is exactly the structure of our three-day Bourbon Trail itinerary. With two days, stay closer to town using the two-day bourbon itinerary. Then check when to book each tour, because fall weekends fill weeks ahead, and use the distillery tours comparison to choose between tours at each stop.
Where to stay as a trail base
Staying in Bardstown puts most of the region’s stops within half an hour, which is the whole point of using it as a base. Two options tie in directly with the trail. The Trail Hotel on New Haven Road became an official Kentucky Bourbon Trail partner in August 2025, the only full-service hotel in Bardstown with that designation, and it runs a distillery shuttle for guests; see our Trail Hotel page. Log Still rents B&B suites and cottages on its own campus, so you can sleep at a trail stop. For everything else, from downtown inns to chain hotels on the bypass, start with our where to stay in Bardstown guide.
Book early for fall. Bourbon Festival weekend in September is the hardest weekend of the year for rooms, and October weekends are close behind.
Is it still worth “doing the trail”?
Without the passport, the trail is less of a checklist and more of a map, and that is an improvement. Instead of rushing 18 stamps, pick the four to six stops that suit you, give each one time and add a non-member like Willett. From Bardstown, with a dozen stops inside an hour, you can do that without ever packing your suitcase twice.
