Flossmoor Station Brewery (via Flickr moonrat42)

I recently met a fellow carfree Chicagoan who wanted to go to Three Floyds Brewery's Dark Lord Day on April 24 but wasn't sure how to get there. It may be an ordeal to get to Three Floyds, but fortunately we also have plenty of other easy excursions for exploring great beer.

Dark Lord Day is a beer festival at Three Floyds in Munster, Indiana, over 7 miles from the South Shore Line Hammond station or a little over 10 miles from the Flossmoor station on the Metra Electic line, and Pace bus connections won't get you much closer. So on a normal day if you wanted a brewery tour, your best bet would probably be to take the Metra Electric and arrange a cab with Classic Taxi, and plan on hitting up Flossmoor Station brewery in the same day. But luckily a number of Chicago bars are offering charter buses down to Dark Lord Day:

• Drinks Over Dearborn

• Sheffield's
• Lush Wine & Spirits

If you're not up for going to Munster, the Craft Brewers Conference comes to Chicago this week with a number of public events that look promising.

Chicago also has a growing number of great local breweries (and one local distillery) that are well worth checking out:

• Half Acre (4257 N Lincoln, Chicago, IL, near the Irving Park Brown Line stop) -- Offers free tours on Saturdays and Sundays at 1 p.m. and has a retail storefront where you can taste and buy the beers.

• Goose Island Clybourn Brewery (1800 N Clybourn, Chicago, IL, near the North and Clybourn Red Line stop) -- Offers tours and tastings.
• Metropolitan Brewing (5121 N Ravenswood, Chicago, IL, long walk from Argyle Red Line or Damen Brown Line stops) -- Offers tours for a small fee (the next one is Sat., April 17, at 3 p.m.)
• Koval Distillery (5121 N Ravenswood, Chicago, IL, long walk from Argyle Red Line or Damen Brown Line stops) -- Offers occasional paid tasting classes at the distillery.

Further from home, check out these other breweries accessible by train:

• Flossmoor Station (1035 Sterling Avenue, Flossmoor, IL, by the Flossmoor Metra Electic stop) -- Offers free tours on the second Sunday of the month.

• Lakefront Brewery (1872 N Commerce, Milwaukee, WI) -- Offers regular tours for a small fee that includes a pint glass and tastings. Milwaukee is only an hour and a half away by Amtrak. It's an easy walk from the station to the brewery, and there's plenty of things to do in Milwaukee to turn this into a nice daytrip.
• New Holland Brewing (Holland, MI) -- Has a pub in downtown by the Amtrak station and offers tours at the brewery just over two miles from the Amtrak station. Unfortunately, the Amtrak schedule doesn't make it possible to do this as a daytrip -- you'll likely have to stay a night or two and explore downtown Holland and its beach.