HOW LONG DO YOUR TOURS LAST?

Our tours last for about three hours, all up, although they can go for up to four hours if we have delays with food or if everyone is just having a really swell time! That includes about two hours of walking and one hour of socialising/bar visits.

HOW MANY BARS DO WE VISIT ON YOUR TOURS?

All tours include visits to three of the City’s best bars. We also go past a bunch of other bars for you to sample at your leisure.

HOW LONG DO WE STAY AT EACH BAR?

At our first two bars we generally stay about 30-45mins. At our final bar you can stay as long as you want!

WHAT FOOD IS INCLUDED ON THE TOUR?

No food is included on the tours. We recommend you eat lunch or dinner before coming on the tour!

ARE THERE TOILET STOPS?

We all worry about toilets! Don’t worry, we stop at three bars along the way so you’ll have plenty of options to relieve yourself.

IS THE TOUR SUITABLE FOR CHILDREN?

The tour is not really designed for anyone under 18 years of age as we are attending bars. We suggest you leave the kids at home and have a really great night!

Under 18 year olds can visit Victorian bars, but by law they must be accompanied by their parent/s. If your booking includes people under 18 years of age, please let us know when you book.

ARE DRINKS INCLUDED ON THE TOUR?

Yes, each tour has drinks included, one per stop.

IS THIS TOUR A PUB CRAWL?

We can’t stress this enough: our tours are not pub crawls, and never will be. Drinking History Tours was set up primarily as a fun, interesting walking tour, a way to take in the sights, smells and attractions of Marvellous Melbourne. We visit three bars along the way to give everyone a chance to experience Melbourne’s unique bars and get to know each other.

HOW MANY PEOPLE LIVE IN MELBOURNE

Melbourne is the second largest city in Australia behind Sydney, with a population in 2017 of 4.8 million people. The city is due to overtake Sydney as the most populous city in Australia by the 2030s.

HOW MANY BARS DOES MELBOURNE HAVE?

For a long time there were only two places to buy alcohol – hotels and restaurants. The rules stated that restaurants had to serve a meal with alcohol, while hotels had to provide accommodation and have food available.

Liquor licences were so hard to get and rules so restrictive, that by 1986, Melbourne only had 571 licenced venues, down from 4900 in 1910.

But slowly things began to change. In 1986, the State Government made sweeping changes to liquor licences, allowing restaurants to serve beer without food and hotels to serve beer without the need to provide accommodation. And they allowed bars to stay open until midnight. 

But the big law change came in 1994, when then Premier Jeff Kennett changed a rule that said every bar or pub had to install a kitchen. This rule was actually designed to help Crown Casino, which was building a massive development in South Bank. But this simple change made opening smaller bars much cheaper. That, combined with cheap rents in the CBD, led to the rise of Melbourne’s famed laneway bar culture.

As a result of these changes, Melbourne has 14,423 liscenced bars as of 2018. On average, two new liquor licences were granted every day for 20 years from 1986.