The Met's Spooky Side, From Funerary Masks to Still Lifes
A two-hour themed walk through The Met's Egyptian, American and European art, looking at how cultures have pictured fear.
This is a guided two-hour walk inside The Metropolitan Museum of Art, run by Fable & Lark around a single theme: how different cultures have pictured the fearsome and the gruesome. Expect discussion, an activity and handouts along the way. Museum admission comes with the ticket and stays valid for the rest of the day after the tour ends. The operator says the tour runs all year and that it likes sharing it most in the spooky season, which puts late October right in its sweet spot.
Ages 8 and up can book, in child, youth, adult and senior price bands, and the operator lists all tour materials as included. The listing recommends the tour for children 10 and up.
Ghost Stories: A Mysterious, Macabre Tour in the Metropolitan MuseumTwo-hour themed tour inside The Met with discussion, an activity and handouts; museum admission included and valid all day after the tour.www.viator.comFunerary Masks, Still Lifes and a Question About Fear
The route crosses cultures and centuries. The listing names funerary masks, still lifes, sculpture and Flying Dutchmen from Egyptian, American and European collections, without promising a fixed list of objects. The operator frames the whole route as a search for what frightens people, and why.
Travelers describe the format as a conversation. One 2024 reviewer recalls choosing up to three paintings that frightened them and telling the group why; another left with a story attached to pieces they would have walked past. A reviewer who came for straight ghost tales wrote that the tour leaned on fear and how art reflects it, and the operator replied that it shares whatever ghost stories it knows about the museum and its works.
Friday Evening or Saturday Morning, Halloween Included
Departures sit on Friday at 6:00 PM and Saturday at 11:00 AM, and not every week has both. As of October 15, 2026, the booking calendar showed open places on Friday, October 30 at 6:00 PM and on Halloween itself, Saturday, October 31 at 11:00 AM, while the two Saturdays before it were not running.
The operator says evening tours suit the theme especially well, with the museum's own atmosphere doing part of the work, and The Met lists Friday and Saturday hours until 9:00 PM. A Friday start ends around 8:00 PM with about an hour of open galleries left on the same ticket. A Saturday start leaves the whole afternoon.
The Museum Stays Open Around You
The tour moves through The Met during regular opening hours, with the public around you. One reviewer who expected the museum to be closed found it loud and hard to hear in a group.
Parents who brought children describe the guide drawing the kids into the questions, and one family traveling with older kids wrote that it was not scary at all. Another traveler, who comes with a parent who often uses a wheelchair, wrote that the guide planned routes with elevators and no stairs.
Booking, Group Size and Cancellation
One booking takes up to ten travelers, and the listing caps a shared departure at twelve. Reviewers describe groups of two, four and six.
Cancel at least 24 hours before the start for a full refund; inside that window the listing gives no refund. The listing also lets a departure be cancelled when too few travelers book. Its accessibility checkboxes mark the tour wheelchair accessible and also mention infants in strollers, which sits oddly with an age range that starts at eight. The operator's own pages say nothing about access, and anyone who needs step-free routes should raise it at booking.
Meet the guide at the giant statue of a seated pharaoh in The Met's Great Hall, to the right of the central information desk. The guide holds a sign with the tour's name, checks the booking and hands over a paper ticket. The listing asks late arrivals to call or text the number it gives, and the ticket is then left at the Group Check-in Desk under the tour's name and first stop. Two hours later, the galleries the tour opened up are still there to wander.