12 Museums and Zoos Where You Can Spend the Night

This is one of Chicago's most anticipated family events of the summer. Children ages 6 to 12 can bring their sleeping bags and wander around the museum, participate in workshops, and hear bedtime stories underneath Sue, the T-Rex. Cost is $60 per person. Read more about it here.

Here guests get to fall asleep as sharks swim past. Included in the $120 fee: a behind-the-scenes tour, reserved seating in the dolphin amphitheater, a 4D immersion film, as well as dinner and breakfast. Read more about it, here.

Die-hard baseball fans dream of making the pilgrimage to Cooperstown, New York to see the Baseball Hall of Fame, and now kids aged 7 to 12 can go a step further. For $49.95 a person, fans get to check out baseball artifacts after hours and enjoy special activities, like re-creating radio broadcasts of famous homerun calls. More here.

Who says kids get to have all the fun? While there are overnight programs for children throughout the year, the Philadelphia Zoo invites the adults to get up-close to live animals during an after-dark park tour. And, yes, there are cocktails. More here.

The Maritime Museum in San Diego lets families on board the world’s oldest active sailing ship, the Star of India, for the whole night. The evening includes an imaginary 1870s voyage, where kids learn how to raise sails, navigate the seas using the stars, and sing famous sea shanties. The cost: $75 each. More here.

Families get to tour the zoo after hours, play games, do crafts, have a marshmallow roast, and enjoy hayrides before calling it quits for the night. Read more about it here.

In New York City, visitors can bed down on the famous war ship, Intrepid. For $120 a person, overnighters get to explore the Hangar and Flight Decks and take part in a treasure hunt. Read more about it here.

For $175 a person, kids and their parents get to fall asleep by the sea lions. Just be prepared for an interesting wake up call! Read more about it here.

Who doesn’t want to play spy for the night? That’s why this Washington, D.C. museum is letting kids aged 9 to 13 embrace their inner James Bond. The program includes participants getting top-secret KidSpy training, gather intelligence, break secret codes, uncover secrets, and track down a bad guy. Cost is $115 a person. Read more about it here.

Children and their parents are invited to spend the night at one of Manhattan’s most famous museums and go on a hunt for fossils after hours. According to the website you can “settle down beneath the 94-foot-long blue whale, next to African elephants, or at the base of a striking volcanic formation and fall asleep in the darkened halls of one of the world’s most beloved museums.” Space is limited and dates sell out quickly. Cost is $145 per person. Read more about it here.

This program in Washington, D.C. lets you fall asleep to the sound of howling wolves. As the sun sets, guests pitch a tent on Lion/Tiger Hill and take a tour with an animal keeper. The program is offered for both families and as an adults-only from June through September. Read more about it here.

A scavenger hunt and evening expedition are all part of this one-of-a-kind sleepover in Philadelphia. Kids aged 6 to 12 can check out mummies and hieroglyphics before curling up beneath the foot of the third-largest granite Sphinx in the world. It'll set you back $55 a person. Read more about it here.