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Fresh ideas for teens visiting (or re-visiting) the capital and its attractions with their folks.

We recently explored our own backyard with13-year-old daughter Maddy and 12-year-old son Jamie, and found three museums of interest to older kids and teens, plus a great hotel:

International Spy Museum

Our nation’s Capital fittingly has the largest U.S. museum devoted to espionage. Since launching in 2002, the International Spy Museum has become a major tourist attraction, housed within walking distance to the White House and the FBI (but not the secretive CIA out in Virginia). Upon entering the museum, visitors assume a secret identity, build a "cover" and attend a video briefing on the nature of spying. The "School for Spies" exhibit identifies how spies are recruited and trained and displays the tricks of their trade, including lipstick pistols and microdots (documents as tiny as punctuation marks). Visitors break codes, search for spies and become the subjects of covert surveillance through interactive exhibits with some cutting edge visual effects.

Our kids loved crawling through hidden air ducts and playing with computer games that required them to scrutinize video footage to identify a disguised spy (a young, attractive blonde woman who was transformed into an old, bald guy with a limp). While there is a nod to some "Boris and Natasha" cartoons and the Austin Powers and James Bond movies, this impressive museum delves much deeper and is best appreciated by teenage kids who can slow down and examine detailed exhibits.

The International Spy Museum (866/SPY-MUSEUM, 202/EYE-SPY-U), located at 800 F Street NW is open daily from 10am to 8pm from April through October, 10am to 6pm from November through March. Advance tickets are recommended in spring and summer and can be purchased online.

National Museum of the American Indian

Opened in September, 2004, the National Museum of the American Indian stands out handsomely on the National Mall, near the Air and Space Museum.  Fifteen years in the making in consultation with many Native Americans, it occupies the last open space on The Mall. Carved to appear windswept, the rough limestone exterior is surrounded by forests, wetlands and crops, a "natural" environment. The museum's entrance faces east toward the rising sun, and other features include a prism window, a 120-foot-high atrium called the Potomac, as well as some fountains that kids will find tempting to experience. This re-creation of nature contrasts dramatically with the Capitol Building towering above all only a few blocks away.

We entered the splendid building, spent a moment reading and listening to the words of welcome in hundreds of Native tongues, grabbed a Family Guide at the info desk and headed for the top (4th) floor using the massive elevators.  We then worked our way down, starting at the Lelawi Theater for a brief multi-media introduction to the museum and Native life.

Two main exhibits flank the theater: Our Universe introduces various Native cultures through cosmological themes and exhibits, while Our Peoples offers interactive exhibits giving voice to the past 500 years as Native cultures struggled to survive the onslaught of newcomers.  One level down Our Lives looks at eight Native communities in today’s world, concentrating on those aspects that make up the identities of Native people. (Don’t miss the Bombardier, a combination Hummer/tank/snowmobile that is used for ice fishing in Manitoba.)

By this time we needed a break from exhibits, so we checked out the Resource Center with its hands-on classroom and Interactive Learning Center (computer stations), where visitors can focus on areas of interest (or send an e-mail post card from the Museum, as ours kids did). Down one level is the wonderful Roanoke Museum Store with books, music and toys (thankfully light on junk), while the Chesapeake Museum Store on the Ground level features often pricey jewelry, textiles and other creations. We all loved the best Smithsonian restaurant in Washington, bar none: the Mitsitam Café, a lovely counter-serve eatery with foods based on indigenous culinary traditions. And French fries.

While the sheer number of exhibits is overwhelming, we simply let our kids naturally gravitate toward those that caught their eyes or ears. As we meandered our way down, we ran into numerous cultural interpreters who answered questions and helped personalize the exhibits. And fortunately there were plenty of attractive, safe places throughout the Museum for our kids to take a "culture break."

While the Family Guide is geared toward preteens and is presented as a small scavenger hunt, it does help everybody focus on the meaning of the seemingly "foreign" exhibits. As our final exhibit, we stood under the 120-foot Rotunda on the ground level, the heart of the building, and looked up and around to see where we had been. The prisms embedded in the walls cast small rainbows around us, and we actually began to sense how we "newcomers" are influenced by the hundreds of Native communities and the land they knew long before us.

The National Museum of the American Indian (202/633-1000), located at 4th Street and Independence Avenue, SW is open daily from 10am to 5:30pm. Use the L'Enfant Plaza exit of the Metro, much closer to this museum than the Smitsonian Museum stop. Admission is free. (No strollers available when we visited.)