The South Street Seaport Museum is opening its ships and galleries for free on two Saturdays in a row. Family Day takes over the museum campus on Saturday, October 24, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., and a Halloween edition follows on Saturday, October 31, also from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Both days come with free general admission, which normally costs $18 for adults, $15 for seniors and students and $5 for children.

The museum sits on the cobblestone blocks at the eastern edge of the Financial District, with its main galleries at 12 Fulton Street and its historic ships tied up at Pier 16. Free tickets for both days can be booked on the museum's website. Preregistration is encouraged, and the museum says walk-up visitors will be let in as space allows.

Family Day on October 24

Family Day is built around a bingo card. Kids pick one up, then work their way through the museum's ships and exhibitions, collecting a stamp at each activity station. Completing the card earns a prize.

The stations on the museum's list include making cyanotypes (the blue-toned photographic prints made with sunlight), a food-themed activity that tests the senses, rebus puzzles aboard the 1885 tall ship Wavertree, Lenape games, and a scavenger hunt through Maritime City, the museum's three-floor exhibition at the A.A. Thomson & Co. building at 213 Water Street.

Family Day was first planned for September and moved to October 24, which puts it on the same day as Taste of the Seaport. That festival, run by the museum together with The Seaport, sets up on Piers 16 and 17 from noon to 4 p.m. with local restaurants and family activities. Tasting tickets start at $70, and the money raised goes to two neighborhood public schools: Spruce Street School (P.S. 397) and Peck Slip School (P.S. 343). The museum will run a station in the festival's KidZone where children fish for facts about the old Fulton Fish Market, and visitors who stop by can pick up free passes to come back to the museum on another date. KidZone tickets are sold separately from the free museum admission.

Halloween on October 31

The following Saturday, the museum turns the Wavertree into the setting for a Halloween scavenger hunt. Visitors follow clues around the 1885 ship, collecting old sailors' superstitions along the way, and finishing the hunt earns a treat.

From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Pier 16 hosts a Healthful Halloween Fair with Mommy Poppins, the New York family activities guide, with drop-in Halloween crafts and free samples of healthier Halloween snacks. A costume parade steps off at 2 p.m., with prizes on the line. From 3 to 5 p.m., trick-or-treating spreads out across the Seaport neighborhood.

What free admission covers

General admission on both days takes visitors aboard two vessels at Pier 16: the Wavertree, an iron-hulled tall ship built in 1885, and the Ambrose, a lightship from 1908 that once marked the entrance to New York Harbor. It also covers both first-floor exhibitions in the Schermerhorn Row galleries at 12 Fulton Street and the Maritime City exhibition at 213 Water Street.

Admission also now includes The Promise of Liberty: Words That Shaped a Nation, an exhibition of historic documents that the museum has extended through November 29.

More Halloween programs at the museum

Two paid programs fill out the museum's October calendar. On Sunday, October 25, A Haunted Harbor Halloween starts at 3 p.m. at a Long Island City bar, then boards NYC Ferry for a ride down the East River with short talks on herbal medicine, the city's witch history, folklore and harbor legends. The group lands at the Wavertree around 4:15 p.m. for sound baths, performances and workshops on deck. Tickets run $15 to $20, and a Wavertree-only ticket lets people join on the ship starting at 4 p.m. Preregistration is required.

The museum's Sinister Secrets of the Seaport walking tour runs through the season. The 90-minute outdoor walk covers crime and scandal stories from local newspapers dating from the 1790s to the 1990s, with a guessing game along the way. It meets at Ryan Maguire's Bar & Restaurant at 28 Cliff Street, one drink or soft drink is included, and tickets are $30 to $40. The tour covers about a mile and is meant for ages 13 and up.

Getting there

Take the A, C, 2, 3, 4, 5, J or Z train to Fulton Street and walk east toward the river. The museum's regular hours are Wednesday to Sunday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., with last entry to museum spaces at 4:30 p.m. On busy days, visitors can check in at any of the museum's historic buildings or at the red tent at the foot of the Wavertree gangway on Pier 16.

Book free general admission for October 24 or October 31 through the museum's admission page, and check each event page for the day's full schedule.

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