Klimpark Fun Forest Amsterdam — Attraction in Amstelveen

First time at Fun Forest! Amazing time! A lot of exercise! A big recommendation for an activity outside the busy center of Amsterdam. I went on a Sunday with three friends (29 to 37 yo) in the morning. We completed the levels from 4th to 8th in 3 hours. It wasn’t too busy, but I know that many schools prepare trips to this activity when summer is coming, so we were lucky to skip that. I would like to mention some suggestions for future visitors and the proper crew of the Fun Forest: WEAR GLOVES. The tickets suggest bringing work gloves for safety. I brought my short gardening gloves from Action (1€) approximatelly. During all the circuits I was thinking how good and smart was to bring those. Because sometimes (when you need extra safety, lose balance, etc) you’ll need to grip harder and without gloves the metal hurts. WATER. There’s a big water container with some plastic cups in the middle of the fun forest. That’s great when you don’t want to carry or leave your bottle of water in the middle of nowhere. RAIN. If by any chance you book a day that happens to be raining, I have great news for you. We knew it was going to rain a little bit (even if it was the 13th of July), but we didn’t feel anything at all. The rain was light and we were safe under the trees. We noticed it was drizzling when we went our way to the reception. DIFFICULTY AND WORK OUT. We skipped the first 4 levels following the instructions of the crew (the beginner levels were too busy and she thought we could manage directly in the medium levels). After levels 6 and 7, you really notice how the difficulty is increasing. I started working out for a few months ago, and I was wondering if I could have managed finishing the 8 levels without that previous workout. EMPTY YOUR POCKETS. This rule isn’t followed by everybody. We’ve seen adults taking out their phones from their pockets IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STATIONS (hanging on the ropes, balancing on the logs) to take pictures of their children. This is completely unacceptable, risky, and inappropriate behaviour. Some people in the reviews comment about how they needed to wait for the scared people to continue the circuit, but if one of these adults had an accident while taking a picture, then I would be really angry. On the other hand, for the red helmets, this behaviour should be noticed and reprimanded. INTRODUCTION AND ARNESS. The safety instruction was in Dutch, and the instructor mentioned that she would make a short English version. I understand that we’re in the Netherlands and you should learn Dutch, but in terms of safety, I think the safety speech in English should be as complete as the Dutch. The Dutch explanation was 10 min long with a visual explanation, but the English was like 1 min without visuals. Just fast. Keep this in mind because we’re talking about people going from 4 to 12 m high. Also, nobody checked if we placed correctly any of our arnesses in the beginning of the activity. There’s a poster with some instructions and images, and then is up to you.

I hope I can finish all the levels in my next visit, but first I need to recover from this 3 h of climbing...

The facility itself is awesome, and in all fairness, the staff and experience was great UNTIL my son had an incident with one of the employees, which completely tarnished our experience to the extent that we likely not be back.

Long story short, coming down a zip line, my son got a bit stuck halfway, which happens to all the kids...on all tracks...all day long! Typically, staff will throw up a neatly wrapped rope with a hook that the kid attaches to the harness, and pull the child to the landing platform.

However, what I witnessed, along with multiple parents who later also complained on my behalf, was an employee who was extremely impatient and negligent. He was throwing up a loosely tied end of the rope, with the metal piece at the top. The first two tries, my son couldn't grab it, but I told him to stop and be careful because it was obvious that hook would hit his face. He refused to listen, and lo and behold, the metal hook that he kept swinging upward with force hit my kid's jaw. At this point, I was really vocal and telling him to stop and pay attention to what he's doing. Fourth attempt, the rope lossly wrappeed around his leg, and he yanked it so hard that my kid's legs split wide apart but thankfully the rope detangled and unraveled to the ground on its own. Last attempt, my son finally caught the rope, attached the hook to the harness, and again without keeping any eye contact on my son, he pulled him so hard, that he body slammed my son on the landing platform of the zip line.

At this point, a number of parents were watching and we were all pretty mortified. One father had even tracked him down and told him how unacceptable that was while I was trying to comfort BOTH my kids from down below.

My son barely finished the course. He was not only injured on whole side of his leg, but so freaked out from the aggression that he felt nervous to complete the remaining three zip lines. It was such a mess in the end. And even as we were exiting the forest area, parents kept coming up to tell me how right I was to call out this employee to the manager.

Honestly, it was such a diasterous experience and I would seriously remain vigilant of your kids...

We had a wonderful time! It’s a great activity that stimulates the brain and supports neurodynamic development through coordinated hand and foot movement. Truly one of the best investments you can make in a child’s growth and well-being.

The whole experience was well-organized — with places to sit and rest, and a safe, structured environment for climbing. The instructors were friendly and attentive. Highly recommended!

Update: Please note that not all routes are accessible for children to climb independently. It is clearly stated that adult supervision is required for many of them. My daughter is 134 cm tall and was only allowed to complete couple routes on her own. This was our second visit, and since I wasn’t climbing with her, she had to repeat the same two routes again. It would be helpful to have a bit more flexibility or variety for children in this height range who visit without a...