Fall Family Field Trips

Equipped with a MetroCard and a few dollars, New York families can frolic in apple orchards, meander through cornfield mazes, celebrate fall harvests, and learn how to carve a world-class pumpkin — all without leaving the city’s five boroughs. What follows are a few of the plentiful options for those looking to delight in the pastoral splendor of the season.THE CHILE PEPPER FIESTAThe 15th annual Chile Pepper Fiesta, organized by the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, celebrates the myriad of Brooklyn ethnic groups that savor chili peppers in their diets.Some of the festival’s activities that are geared toward children include cooking workshops and crafts projects. And revelers of all ages can sample flammable flavors from chocolate chile to Indian chutney, and tap their feet to the beat of Caribbean steel drummers, Cajun tunes, and an independent rock band from Mexico.Sunday, September 30, noon-6 p.m., Brooklyn Botanic Garden, 1000 Washington Ave. at Montgomery Street, Brooklyn, 718-623-7200, free with admission to the garden, $8 for adults, $4 for seniors and students 12 and older, and free for children 12 and younger.THE APPLE FESTIVALThe trickiest maneuver in creating an 8-foot-by-8-foot apple crumble is delivering the pan to the open fire to bake, the caretaker of the Queens County Farm Museum in Floral Park, Steve Eftimiades, said, noting that the task requires the help of a tractor.Each year, Mr. Eftimiades creates the giant confection as part of the museum’s annual Apple Festival. The day-long event, held at the 310-year-old farm, also includes activities such as apple-themed relay races, cider-pressing demonstrations, a magic show, as well as various musical performances.As on most other October weekends, museum-goers can feed the farm’s sheep and goats, wander through its apple orchard, vineyard, and pumpkin fields, hop a hayride ($2 a person), stuff a scarecrow ($15), or wind their way through the 3-acre “maize maze.” (adults, $7 ; children, $4).Sunday, October 7, The Queens County Farm Museum, 73-50 Little Neck Parkway, 718-347-3276. Admission is free.OLD HOME DAYVisitors to this leafy Staten Island enclave can explore how New Yorkers lived in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. During the village’s Old Home Day, employees dress in costume of centuries past, and demonstrate old-fashioned chair construction, and candle- and soap-making. The staff also cooks up pumpkin and corn soup outdoors, and bakes bread in a wood-burning oven.Young visitors can partake in a hay jump, a popular childhood pastime of the 18th and 19th centuries, according to Felicity Beal, the village’s director of education and programs. While the activity traditionally involved leaping from a hayloft onto a hay-covered barn floor, here children are invited to jump from a knee-high platform into a hay heap. And there’s a pre-Halloween perk: A 15-minute ride on a shuttle bus leads to the village’s Decker Farm, where families can pick up a pumpkin, embark on a hay ride, and stroll through the 11-acre grounds.Old Home Day, Sunday, October 21, 11 a.m.–5 p.m., 441 Clarke Ave., Staten Island, 718-351-1611, $8 for adults, $7 for seniors, $5 for children ages 5–17; visit to the farm is included. (Regular admission to Historic Richmond Town is $5 for adults, $4 for seniors and students, and $3.50 for children 5-17).BOO AT THE ZOOAt the Bronx Zoo’s annual Halloween festival, “Boo at the Zoo,” visitors can watch a python wind its way through the eye holes of a Jack-O-Lantern, visit the bats in the “World of Darkness” exhibit, listen to a storyteller recite spooky tales, or watch a pumpkin-carving demonstration. There will also be music, art projects, and hay rides.Satellite “Boo at the Zoo” festivities will be held at the Central Park Zoo in Manhattan (at 64th Street, near Fifth Avenue, 212-439-6500), the Queens Zoo (53-51 111th St. in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, 718-271-1500), and the Prospect Park Zoo (450 Flatbush Avenue at Empire Boulevard, Brooklyn, 718-399-7339) between 10 a.m. and5:30 p.m., on October 27–28.Saturday, October 20–Sunday, October 21 and Saturday, October 27–Sunday, October 28, 10 a.m.–4:30 p.m., Bronx Zoo, 2300 Southern Blvd., Bronx, admission $14; hay rides $3. Costumed children 12 and younger are admitted free with a paying adult.

Fall Family Field Trips

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