I visited the three component sites in the span of around a month in late summer/early fall 2021. I had good experiences in all three sites and will recount those in this review with my walking and beverage recommendations. 

Wortel

We spent a beautiful late summer night camping in the Wortel Kolonie after visiting Gorinchem and Woudrichem (two fortress towns from the 2021 extension of Dutch Water Defense Lines). It's possible to reserve part of the small primitive campsite there managed by the Flemish agency Natuur en Bos. From the parking area we walked the 500 m to the campsite tucked away behind a forested lane (one finds it by walking straight then turning right 90 degrees, thereby appreciating the orthagonal layout so prized in the OUV). Natuur en Bos provides a fire pit and wood and in the morning we were treated with some beautiful light through the trees. After breaking camp and grabbing some pastries at a nearby bakery we returned to the main parking area to begin our walk around the colony. Unlike the other sites, little remains architecturally from the original settlement except for some of the large institutional buildings. The scenery is pleasant enough for walking, however, and our route weaved in and out of cultivated fields, areas that have been reforested, across the Dutch border and back and past the paupers' cemetary. There is a small visitors center above the cafe by the parking lot, but all the text there is in Dutch and it pales in comparison to the museums at the other two sites. All told, this was the least of the three sites.

Beverage: Gageleer - a malty ale brewed with bog-myrtle and produced in collaboration with Natuurpunt (Flemish conservation organization - proceeds from the sale help support their nature conservation efforts) available at the colony's cafe.

Walk: we followed the 12.5 km route "Gevangen tussen grens en groen" (the 2013 walk of the year of some kind). Very flat, as you'd expect. Really let's you appreciate the site's famed (?) orthagonal layout and see the few original buildings that remain. Plus there's another cafe halfway through for a bite for lunch.

Veenhuizen

In the middle of October we spent the weekend in the Drenthe-Friesland-Overijssel border area to visit the other components of this site. We started with a visit to the Dutch National Prison Museum. This isn't fully on-topic but the museum does provide a nice history of the site (first an "unfree" colony and now an agricultural landscape with prisons and this prison museum). It's a modern museum with nice interactive displays but no information available in English (the English audioguide was not working on our visit, but some videos had English subtitles and we used Google translate when needed). The kids loved wearing shackles, going in the prison cells, sleep cages and playing in the prison-themed playground. To appreciate the site as a pauper colony, though, we followed the "Audio Journey through The Paupers' Paradise" available in both English and Dutch. This "theatrical audioguide" was written by the author of a bestselling novel about her grandmother's life in Veenhuizen. It really helped the landscape come alive in a way that this site really needs, given that so little of the original structures (at least from the time of the colony's settlement) remain. Parts of it we did with the car (a few stops on the tour are very far from the rest) but the rest we walked. With more time we would have walked the whole route. Especially nice in Veenhuizen are the functionaries' houses with slogans like "Levenslust" and "Werk en bid" tiled prominently on the exteriors.

Beverage: the colony itself has an excellent brewery on the premises - Brouwerij Maallust - located in one of the protected buildings. The 1818 Quadrupel was especially nice.

Walk: definitely the "Audio Journey through The Paupers' Paradise". If you have time, do the full 16 km. We did only the 6 km around the Prison Museum on foot and the rest with the car.

Frederiksoord-Wilhelminaoord

Definitely the best of the three sites, in my humble opinion. The component combines two separate colonies, one (Frederiksoord) the first founded, and both "free" colonies. The museum, just opened in 2019, is very well-done. It had a nice multimedia introduction (thankfully with English subtitles) showing the context and conditions of the "colonists" in their urban poverty origins and dramatized the kinds of experiences they had settling this new landscape. After the multimedia introduction the museum had lots of thematic sections and interactive exhibits on churning butter, using a loom, etc. A separate ticket will give you entrance to an original farmhouse and the first school, both with period furnishing and actors in costume talking about their experiences. We included our visit to the museum midway through an 11 km walk that took in all the major architectural remains from both Frederiksoord and Wilhelminaoord. Another hike with a lot of straight lanes bordered by tall trees edging broad fields. A bit of walking through forest, too.

Beverage: the museum cafe features all the Maallust beers (only bottles, no draft). The Vienna Lager is malty but light and fine for Sunday lunch.

Walk: the 11 km Monumenten route passes by all the major architectural monuments for both colonies and at each there is a sign with info in English and Dutch (with more available, also in German, via a QR code)