Things to Do for a Family With Teenagers in Amsterdam

Canal Tours

• Amsterdam's network of canals make it a natural for boat tours. These traditional glass-topped boats glide through the canals at all hours, including special lighted tours at night. Teens can get a bird's-eye view of the city while having sodas and snacks and listening to entertaining guides provide some history and fun facts about the city's famous sites. Just as with tour buses in other cities, you can get on and off the boats to spend time at a given location, then get back on when you want to and enjoy more of the tour or head to another destination.

Anne Frank House

• Many teens have been exposed to the Anne Frank story during history or English class units about the Holocaust. In a one-of-a-kind experience, visitors can go through the house and get a very real sense of what it was like for Anne Frank and her family to live in hiding from the Nazis. Teens can go up the very narrow staircases and enter through a closet to reach the tiny area where the group lived for two years. Some of the original furnishings, old photographs and writings are still in the house, adding to its authenticity. After the house tour, visitors can learn about the Holocaust at the newly added museum on the ground level.

Museums

• Amsterdam is full of world-class museums, with something for all tastes. The Rijksmuseum contains many paintings by Dutch artists Vermeer and Rembrandt, including the latter's famous "The Night Watch." Teens might prefer the Van Gogh Museum, with sketches, paintings and interesting facts about the eccentric artist. This museum has an excellent self-paced audio tour geared toward tweens and teens, as well as a hands-on scavenger hunt where teens can follow clues to find various fun and quirky items scattered throughout the museum.

Fun, Funky and Fantastic

• Amsterdam is a compact, well-organized city, perfect for teens to explore on foot or via the efficient, affordable tram system. Let teens explore the funky shopping areas around Negen Straaten -- the Nine Streets -- and Dam Square, the quintessential hippie hangout from the '60s and '70s. Amsterdam is a main hub of the world diamond industry, and teens might enjoy a tour of a diamond factory to watch rough stones being cut and polished into finished diamonds. Older teens and adults typically enjoy the Heineken Brewery tour, where they can watch the various stages of the brewing process, then enjoy a little of the finished product at the end of the tour.