Port aventura - Not to be missed (Port Aventura)

Member Name: craftydonna

Product:	Port Aventura
Date:	05/09/06 (201 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fun,

Disadvantages: Tired Feet

We have been to this themepark many times our most recent visit being june 2006.

Admission Price: Because we stayed on site at one of their hotels admission for us was free to this park and the water park which is right next door. At the moment Portaventura has a 14 day ticket prices at £52 adult, £42 child or A 7 day ticket for the price of 3 days £46 adult, £37 child. You can get these tickets from the portaventura website.
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PortAventura is a Universal Mediterranea Resort / American style theme park which is very close to the Spanish resort of Salou.

The park is split into 5 areas:
Mediterrània
Polynesia
China
México
Far West
Each area has its own themed rides and shops related to the land your in. This makes the park easy to navigate as you walk round the lands in a circle.

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Rides: This is a lovely theme park with plenty of rides to choose from and they cater for all the family. The eight looped roller coaster was just excellent, did come off dizzy but worth it. Take a spare set of clothes you will get wet on all the water rides, be warned, there is also no lockers outside these ride for personal items, these have to go with you:(

Queues: The queues for this park are quite short compared to other parks i have been to, we did not wait more than 15 minutes for a ride. The queues for the big rides like Dragon Khan (8 looped coaster) and Hurakan Condor (Free fall tower) were about an hour to 2 hours long because these are the most popular rides for people who like fast and daring rides. Also don't forget to check out the times boards, these are outside all the main rides and give you the current queue waiting times.

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Shows: My children loved the shows the wild west show is not to be missed. Other shows in the park included a bubblebou, Templo del Fuego, china town, can can show,country music, Aloha Tahití, bird show, plus plenty of other samll shows. I have been to other parks and they had headphones for all nationalties to watch the shows but here they did not and several shows are in Spanish.

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Food: was very expensive but plenty of choice as you can visit different lands i.e Mexcio, Far West etc. the best place to eat is the Far West as for some reason this was less busy and they had really good quality steak burgers, which went down really well with my family.
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Characters: The park has a selection of characters who are around the park throughout the day, some can be harder to find than others. On the way into the park is a board which tells you where characters will be that day but they don't actally name the character so you just have to turn up and see whos there. Characters include Woody Woodpecker,Winnie, Splinter,Knothead,Pink Panther,Inspector Clouseau,Popeye,Olivia,Brutus,Betty Boop,Shrek,Donkey and Chilly Willy (penguin). You can have your picture taken with the characters, the photographer will give you a ticket for your photo and they can be brought on your way out of the park at 6 euros each.
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Shops: The park has many different shops where you can buy your character related items. I went a bit crazy on the betty boop items. Compared to other parks the items in the shops were quit cheap.

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Other infomration Tips:

Go to the park on an evening they are open late, its a totally different experience.

Sorry but beware of the Spanish teenagers they are very load and boisterous, my daughter was knocked over several times but they were very sorry and helped her. Its just something i have not experienced before at any other themepark before around the world.

The evening water and lights show is worth a visit as its just amazing, the down side it that its on too late for little ones as it starts at 12 midnight approx.

Avoid the stalls that you can win prices on, they are very expensive compared to other parks.

Height measurement problems- we found it very difficult in finding a stick to measure my daughter to see if she could go on the ride. Most rides at other parks have them right outside the rides.

Candy floss maker didn't even know what he was doing, my mother-in.law did this job many years ago and was going crazy at how he was doing it. He ended up with half it up his arm. The good thing was they were bigger than expected but swamped my daughter.



THIS REVIEW IS ALSO ON CIAO

Summary: A great theme park to visit, try staying at one of there hotels.