Following a five year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) has announced that its popular sleepover experience is returning this autumn.

The experience is available for children aged six to 12-years-old and their caregivers, with sleepovers taking place once a month.

Activities include torchlight tours of the museum’s third and fourth floor exhibition galleries and self-guided explorations of the museum’s first and second floor. The evenings will also include live presentations, scavenger hunts, group games in the Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education, and Innovation, karaoke sessions and bedtime stories.

Visitors will receive a commemorative keepsake, a voucher for future admission and a private shopping experience in the gift shop.Tickets cost from $225, and include an evening snack and a continental breakfast.

“We are excited to reintroduce this celebrated programme that provides a rare opportunity for guests to experience the wonders of the museum long after visitors have gone home,” said AMNH president Sean Decatur.

“Whether it’s the thrill of encountering Tyrannosaurus Rex by flashlight or the awe of sleeping beneath the massive blue whale, the experience is sure to create memories that families will treasure forever.”

The sleepover programme launched at AMNH in 2006 alongside the family film Night at the Museum, and the museum has also hosted adult sleepover events featuring a champagne reception, three course meal, and the chance to sleep under the museum’s iconic 94-foot (fiberglass) blue whale.