The older my boys get, the harder they are to buy for. The things have changed from entertainment to practical. Apple watches, laptops, trendy shoes. Gone are the days with multiple gifts like LEGO sets and toys. Now that they are teenagers, their Christmas and birthday lists seem to be getting shorter, while the things they do want seem to be getting more expensive.
At the same time, I am much less interested in buying stuff just so there are more presents to open. The practical stuff they need like laptops for school or running shoes are not something I can save for under the tree. They need them when they need them. At this age I would rather spend money on something we can do.
An experience gift can be as simple as tickets to a hockey game or an afternoon go-karting. Or it can be the excuse to plan an entire weekend away around something your teenager loves.
It really is true that the “days are long but the years are short” when you have teenagers. Like how did this happen. I know there are only so many years left when I can say, “We’re going away for the weekend,” and they automatically come with me. To be honest, it has already happened that they do not come. (I wrote about it here).
If you have a teenager who doesn’t need more stuff, here are some experience gift ideas they might actually be excited to receive.
1. Tickets to a Professional Sports Game
This would be an easy win in our house.
If your teenager follows a particular team or athlete, buy tickets to see them play rather than another piece of team merchandise. We have built entire trips around sports. We flew to Miami to see Messi play, went to Pittsburgh to see Sidney Crosby and the Penguins and have planned city breaks around whatever games we could get tickets to.
But it doesn’t have to involve getting on a plane. Tickets to your local NHL, NBA, MLS, MLB, WNBA or other professional team can turn an ordinary birthday gift into a day you spend together. If the tickets themselves aren’t particularly exciting to unwrap, print them out and put them inside a team hat or shirt.
2. Concert Tickets
Concert tickets are another great experience gift, particularly once your teenager starts developing their own taste in music.
The trick here is buying tickets to the artist they want to see rather than the artist you think they should want to see. You can make the concert the entire gift or turn it into an overnight trip if the tour isn’t stopping close to home. And yes, you may end up spending two hours listening to music you would never voluntarily play in the car. That’s part of the experience.
3. A Ski or Snowboard Day
If you live within driving distance of the mountains, a day of skiing or snowboarding makes an excellent winter experience gift.
Lift tickets are expensive enough now that a ski day genuinely feels like a gift.
This has also become more worthwhile for us as my boys have gotten older. When they were little, there was a lot of money spent getting everyone onto the mountain for what sometimes felt like very little actual skiing.
With teenagers who can confidently ski, we can spend the entire day exploring the mountain together. If you want to make it a bigger gift, add a night or two at a ski resort and turn it into a weekend away.
4. Surf Lessons
A surf lesson is a fun gift for an adventurous teenager, especially if you can build it into a beach weekend.
You don’t have to travel somewhere tropical either (but if you want to, I highly suggest El Salvador with kids)
We love Tofino in our home country of Canada for exactly this kind of trip. You can surf, hike, eat well and spend plenty of time outside without needing a packed itinerary. If your teen already surfs, consider renting boards for the day rather than booking another lesson.
Either way, you are giving them something to do, which is often much more exciting than another item to bring home.
5. Go-Karting
Go-karting is a great option if you want an experience gift that doesn’t require planning an entire trip.
Book a few races, bring a friend and turn it into an afternoon out.
We have done go-karting while traveling as well, and it is one of those activities that works particularly well with teens because it doesn’t feel like something their parents have dragged them along to do.
You can also pair it with dinner at their favourite restaurant and make an entire birthday outing out of it.
6. A Waterpark Experience
A waterpark isn’t just for little kids.
In fact, teens are finally old enough that you don’t have to follow them up every staircase and stand at the bottom of every waterslide waiting for them.
For a birthday, you could book a day at a waterpark with a couple of friends or turn it into an overnight stay at an indoor waterpark resort. And then there is the seriously over-the-top version. For a milestone birthday, family reunion or several families celebrating together, some resorts even offer a private water park buyout. It certainly isn’t going to be the budget option on this list, but having an entire waterpark to yourselves would be a pretty memorable way to celebrate.
The nice thing about this type of experience with teenagers is that you don’t need to organize every minute. Give them waterslides, food and a few friends and let them go.
7. Tickets to an Amusement Park
Instead of buying your teenager something for their birthday, buy them a day at an amusement park. This works particularly well if they are finally tall enough and brave enough to ride everything.You can keep it relatively simple with a day trip to a park near home or use the gift as the excuse for a bigger trip.
If your teen loves roller coasters, you could even let them choose the park. Sometimes the anticipation of an experience is part of the gift. Having something on the calendar to look forward to for the next few months can be almost as much fun as the day itself.
8. An Adventure Experience
Think ziplining, whitewater rafting, ATV tours, mountain biking, kayaking, climbing or whatever makes sense where you live. One of the things I love about traveling with teens is that the list of things you can do together gets much bigger. They are finally old enough for activities that may have had minimum age, height or weight restrictions when they were younger.
An adventure experience can also be a good way to try something new together. Neither of you has to be an expert. In fact, sometimes it is more fun when neither of you knows what you are doing.
9. A Food Experience
If you have a teenager who loves food, build the gift around eating.
That could be a food tour, cooking class, afternoon tea, tasting experience or simply reservations somewhere they have been wanting to try. This has become one of my favourite parts of traveling with my boys as they have gotten older.
You can also turn it into a challenge. Let them choose a restaurant you haven’t tried before, visit several places for different courses or spend an afternoon trying foods from a neighbourhood you don’t usually visit. And if your teen isn’t particularly adventurous with food, don’t force it. An experience gift should be about something they enjoy.
10. A Hotel Staycation
There is something about staying in a hotel that makes even a place close to home feel like a trip. Book a hotel for a night, order food, use the pool and explore somewhere nearby.
You could also let your teenager bring a friend, particularly for a birthday. This works well when you want to give them a bigger experience without paying for flights or taking several days off work. Look for a hotel with something they will actually use, whether that’s a great pool, games room, sports facilities or a location within walking distance of things they want to do.
11. A Class Based on Something They Love
Not every experience gift has to be a big event. If your teenager has a specific interest, give them a chance to get better at it.
That could mean a photography workshop, cooking class, private sports lesson, art class, ski lesson, music session or something completely niche that you would never have thought to sign them up for when they were younger.
Teenagers are old enough to have genuine interests of their own. Pay attention to what they spend their time watching, talking about and learning online. There may be an experience connected to it that they would never think to ask for.
12. A Trip Built Around Their Interests
This is obviously the biggest experience gift on the list, but it doesn’t necessarily have to mean an elaborate international vacation.
Ask yourself: What is my teenager really into right now?
Sports?
Anime?
Surfing?
Food?
Music?
Skiing?
Theme parks?
Then build a trip around it.
Some of our best trips with teenagers have worked because there was something in the destination that immediately appealed to them. A professional sports game can be the reason you choose a city. Anime can help shape a trip to Japan. Surfing can turn Tofino into somewhere your teenager is asking you to visit.
Once you have that anchor, you can build the rest of the trip around things everyone wants to do.
And I think that is one of the secrets to traveling with teenagers.
The entire vacation doesn’t have to revolve around them anymore, but giving them something they are genuinely excited about makes it much easier to get their buy-in for everything else.
Why I’m Choosing More Experiences as My Kids Get Older
I don’t think every gift needs to be an experience.
There will always be things my kids want and need, and sometimes opening an actual present is fun.
But the older they get, the more I find myself thinking about how many weekends, school breaks and summers we actually have left with them living at home.
Stuff will come and go.
The trip where we flew somewhere to watch their favourite player, the ridiculous go-kart race where Mom somehow won, the first time they stood up on a surfboard or the weekend they got to bring a friend away?
Those are the things I hope they remember.
And selfishly, those are the gifts that give me something too: more time doing something with them before they are off planning adventures of their own.
Lindsay Nieminen hails from Vancouver, Canada and shares her love of travel on this website. She is passionate about showing others that they should not put off traveling the world just because they have children or are single parents. She aims to encourage them to seek out adventure, whether it is at home or abroad by providing information on how just about everywhere can be a destination to explore as a family.