The Hudson Valley is full of haunts and legends that come alive in spirit during the spookier months. From abandoned ruins to modern day towns, there is plenty of opportunity to go off and ghost hunt on your own, but these guided tours provide the history, the evidence, and sometimes the right paranormal equipment to almost guarantee a ghost sighting or two in your neighborhood.
Ghosts of Albany
Hilton Albany Hotel, Albany
Duration: 90 minutes
Haunts to look for: ghosts of gangsters, night watchmen, and doomed lovers
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Experience the Capitol in a new light during evening ghost tours that pass by the State Capitol Building, State Supreme Court, and other State Capitol landmarks. Watch out for the ghosts of gangsters, a Capitol Building night watchman, bawdy women, and doomed lovers, among other spirits, who are legendary haunts in downtown Albany. Test your courage at this nightly event that was named “Top Five Fall Events” in the Capitol District by Times Union.
Haunted Huguenot Street
Dubois Fort Visitor Center, New Paltz
Duration: 60 minutes
Haunts to look for: ghosts of the Budd family
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Opening this year on Friday the 13th of October, this guided tour of New Paltz’s historic Huguenot Street immerses visitors in the true crime story of the Budd family’s attempted murder. The Budds ran New Paltz’s first hotel around 250 years ago, and someone tried to poison the family in a trial that gripped the region at the time but has since been lost to history. Now, visitors can act as the investigators on the case and solve the mystery once and for all in this interactive theater experience tour.
Old Dutch Church Cemetery
Kingston
Duration: 60 minutes
Haunts to look for: ghosts of Dutch settlers, British soldiers, and Native Americans
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Dating back to 1658, the Old Dutch Church Cemetery has seen many different groups of people, from Native Americans to British soldiers. The cemetery is also the final resting place of many Revolutionary Kingston natives and George Clinton, the first governor of New York. Theatre on the Road brings this tour to life by telling stories and haunting tales of the former residents during this educational, entertaining, and spooky candlelit tour.
Pine Bush UFO & Paranormal Museum
Pine Bush
Duration: 90 minutes
Haunts to look for: UFOs, Sasquatch
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Pine Bush is home to many unexplainable happenings in the Hudson Valley, and this museum seeks to answer questions on all things aliens, unusual sightings, and extra-terrestrial explorations. Guided tours of the museum delve deep into the unknown to show artifacts and evidence of local mysteries, while the haunted history lantern tour takes visitors to sites of paranormal activity, reported ghost sightings, and ghost investigations in Pine Bush.
Sleepy Hollow Cemetery
Sleepy Hollow
Duration: 120 minutes
Haunts to look for: ghost of Washington Irving
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This evening lantern tour takes visitors on a two-hour-long journey through the famous Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, where they can see the final resting place of titans of industry like Andrew Carnegie and William Rockefeller and the author of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” Washington Irving. Admiring beautiful art, architecture, and cool cemetery symbolism along the way, visitors will find their way by kerosene lantern light during evenings through Thanksgiving weekend during the guided ghost tours.
Tarrytown Music Hall
Tarrytown
Duration: 45 minutes
Haunts to look for: ghosts of the Rockefellers and Vanderbilts
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Built in 1885, the Tarrytown Music Hall has seen its fair share of famous Hudson Valley families such as the Rockefellers, Goulds, and Vanderbilts. A venue for presidents’ speeches and women’s suffrage rallies, the music hall has long since served as a vessel through which many people passed, and some didn’t leave. An official site of the Haunted History Trail of New York, the music hall has been investigated several times and has consistently shown paranormal activity.
The Haunted Shanley Hotel
Napanoch
Duration: 90 minutes
Haunts to look for: paranormal activity
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Known for being a paranormal hotel, The Shanley has been featured in TV shows like Ghost Lab and Ghost Hunters. The hotel does day tours and, if you’re brave enough, you can even stay the night, but beware, because visitors have reported rocking chairs rocking on their own, doors slamming, piano music, footsteps, and mysterious clock chimes while renting a room. Many have also seen shadows and apparitions, some of which can be experienced on the tour with the help of paranormal investigation equipment.
Related: Halloween Events for Spooktacular Fun in the Hudson Valley
