Salem Walking Tour

Free Salem Walking Tour with Roamee Pro

Roamee Pro, also known as Roamee, offers a free Salem walking tour with audio narration. Use it to explore Salem Witch Museum, Peabody Essex Museum, House of the Seven Gables, plus hidden gems like Derby Wharf and McIntire Historic District without booking a group tour.

This Salem walking tour is built for travelers searching for a audio guide, a free walking route, or the Roamee app for Salem. Start with Salem Witch Museum and Peabody Essex Museum, then branch into local context, photo spots, and neighborhood stories as you walk.

• •Salem Witch Museum — Housed in a former church built in 1846, this museum uses life-size stage sets with dramatic lighting and narration to recreate the hysteria of 1692 when accusations of witchcraft tore apart this Puritan community. The exhibit walks visitors through 13 stage settings depicting the events from the first accusations in February through the final executions in September, and a second-floor exhibit examines the evolution of witch persecution from medieval Europe to modern hate crimes. Over 300,000 visitors annually make it the most visited attraction in Salem.
• •Peabody Essex Museum — Founded in 1799 by sea captains returning from voyages to the Far East, this is the oldest continuously operating museum in America with a collection of over 1.8 million objects spanning maritime art, Asian export art, American decorative arts, and photography. The museum's crown jewel is Yin Yu Tang, a complete 200-year-old Chinese house from Anhui province that was dismantled, shipped to Salem, and reassembled inside the museum over seven years. The modern wing, designed by Moshe Safdie and opened in 2003, creates a striking contrast with the museum's original Federal-period buildings.
• •House of the Seven Gables — Built in 1668 for Captain John Turner, this dark timber mansion on the Salem waterfront is the oldest surviving 17th-century wooden mansion in New England and the setting for Nathaniel Hawthorne's 1851 novel of the same name. The house features a secret staircase, period-furnished rooms, and original architectural details including the seven peaked gables visible from the harbor. Hawthorne's own birthplace, a small red house built around 1750, was moved to the property in 1958 and is included in the tour.
• •Charter Street Cemetery — Established in 1637, just 11 years after Salem's founding, this is one of the oldest burial grounds in the United States, containing graves of Mayflower passengers, witch trial judges, and Revolutionary War veterans. Notable interments include Governor Simon Bradstreet, Justice John Hathorne (Hawthorne's ancestor and witch trial magistrate), and Mary Corey, whose husband Giles was pressed to death during the trials. The carved headstones, featuring winged skulls, hourglasses, and angels, are outstanding examples of colonial funerary art.

• •Derby Wharf — Extending nearly half a mile into Salem Harbor, this wharf was built in 1762 by merchant Elias Hasket Derby, who became America's first millionaire through privateering during the Revolution and trade with the East Indies. Now part of the Salem Maritime National Historic Site — the first National Historic Site in the United States, designated in 1938 — the wharf offers a windswept walk with views of the harbor, the 1871 Derby Wharf Light Station, and the replica tall ship Friendship moored nearby.
• •McIntire Historic District — Named for Samuel McIntire, the self-taught architect and woodcarver who designed many of its finest buildings, this neighborhood of elegant Federal-period mansions was built by Salem's wealthiest sea captains and merchants between 1780 and 1820. Chestnut Street, often called the most beautiful street in America, features a continuous row of three-story brick and clapboard mansions with McIntire's signature carved wooden ornaments, fan-shaped doorway arches, and rooftop widow's walks from which merchants' wives watched for returning ships.