Emmen is a city in southeast Drenthe, close to the German border and the peat colonies that shaped this part of the Netherlands. It is not a postcard canal town. Its appeal is more practical and regional: a serious zoo, forest walks, megalithic tombs, and museums that explain the peat landscape around it.
Most visitors come for Wildlands Adventure Zoo Emmen, the largest attraction in town and one of the main family days out in the northern Netherlands. The old zoo grounds survive as Rensenpark, a green pocket in the centre with cultural projects and paths where animal enclosures used to be.
Emmen also sits on the Hondsrug, the sandy ridge famous for hunebedden, the prehistoric stone burial chambers of Drenthe. Hunebed D45 in the Emmerdennen forest is the best local example. East of town, Veenpark makes the peat colonies tangible with reconstructed villages, rails, and workers' houses.