PortAventura

For me, there is nothing better than a good adrenaline rush. If you are reading my entries that I am currently writing, you have probably noticed, that I have moved to Barcelona at the end of September to do a traineeship at a local English school. I must say that I love this job, but working with children is also a very demanding thing to do every day, so I had to find a good way of relaxing. And amusement parks are just perfect way of relaxation!

I have already heard of an awesome amusement park just about an hour outside Barcelona before I came to Spain, and, as you can imagine, I just could not resist going there. Believe me, this is one of the most awesome places I have ever been to! I probably sound like a little kid now, but the attractions there are not really made for little kids. The amusement park is called PortAventura, and it is the biggest amusement park in Spain. On my second day in Barcelona, I decided to go on an organised tour there.

In case you are interested in other things besides the amusement park itself, there is also an aquatic park, called Costa Caribe, right next to the PortAventura, and there is also another theme park right next to it that was built in 2016, called Ferrari Land. At the time I was in PortAventura, this park hadn't been built yet.

For me, the most interesting fact about the future Ferrari Land is that it has the tallest rollercoaster in Europe (yes, even taller than Shambhala, which you can try in PortAventura, and let me spoil the surprise and already tell you that it is literally breathtaking) and it has an acceleration of the Formula One. I am really looking forward to try it one day!

How to get there?

You have plenty of choices about how to reach the PortAventura park. For example, you can choose to go there by your car, public transport, with an organized tour – shuttle coach, and there is even an airport very close to the park. At first, I wanted to go there by train, because the train station is situated just outside the park, but since I was not familiar with the transport in Barcelona yet, I decided that an organised tour is probably my safest bet. And I must say that I was very happy with my choice of transportation.

You have a variety of organized tours to PortAventura online, such as on web pages Viator and City Explora, but I decided to book it directly on the Julia Travel website. It was not the cheapest option (on the other websites, the tour was about ten Euros cheaper), but I wanted to avoid booking via other agencies, because in the past, I have learned that this can lead to trouble sometimes. It happened that I once paid for the tour via another agency, and at the day of the tour, when I arrived to the place, they told me that my reservation is not in the system. So, I lost quite a lot of money, and a chance to go on a tour. Ad this issue still has not been solved until today. Well, this is why I booked directly on the company's webpage, and it all completely met my expectations.

The price for the tour was 66 Euros, and it also included the shuttle bus ride directly to the PortAventura Park. Considering the price of only the entrance ticket, this is more than a bargain. Also, the shuttle bus is super comfortable, and it was only half full, so you could have two seats for yourself, not just one – this was very useful, so I had a place where to put my backpack and a jacket.

I would like to point out that, by choosing this tour, you do not get a guide (well, you do not need it, but still…), and the driver we had, was not very responsive to our questions. To enter the bus, you have to redeem the voucher that was sent to your e – mail, at the Julia Travel agency in Carrer de Balmes 5, where you will also receive an entrance ticket to the park. Be careful, do not throw the bus ticket away – you will be asked to show it again on your return journey. One of the passengers on our bus has lost it, and he had to argue with the driver for like ten minutes, until several passengers on the shuttle bus said that they remember him from the way to the park in the morning.

The way from Barcelona to PortAventura started at eight thirty in the morning, and we reached the park at a few minutes past ten o'clock, exactly as promised. Since it was a week day, most of the attractions were still closed at that time. Or, the more interesting thing, they were doing a test ride with a sort of crash dummies on the Hurakan Condor drop tower.

For a second, I was even afraid that something is wrong with it and I would not be able to go on that ride, but it turned out that they do this every day, just to ensure that the ride is smooth enough. Well, 'smooth', because this kind of rides are never a good thing for your back and neck. But it is totally worth it, at least for me. After all, when you get older, your back will hurt anyway, so why not enjoy while you are still young?

There is one more thing that I would like to warn you about – try to get to the shuttle bus on time on the way back – it departs exactly at seven o'clock in the evening. There were three people who did not show up before the scheduled time, and the bus departed without them. This could be a big problem if you do not know where the train station is, or if you do not have any money with you. So, better be there fifteen minutes earlier than a minute too late. The woman at Julia Travel even advised me, when I was exchanging my ticket at the office in the morning, that I should be on the bus fifteen minutes before departure.

Opening times and tickets

The opening times of the park depend on the season, and in some periods (in winter months), the park is closed for a few months – this is the time when they renovate and build new attractions.

The entrance tickets for PortAventura are more expensive than in any other amusement park I have been to so far, but on the other hand, it is totally worth it. I would actually pay even more if necessary.

As for the actual ticket prices, you can choose between daily tickets, multiple day tickets, and even an annual pass (which is actually the best option if you are planning to visit the park more than twice in a year).

A normal daily ticket cost €45 for adults and €39 for kids. If you are planning to spend two days in the park, you will pay around €50 as an adult and €44 as a kid. A three – day ticket cost €79 for adults and €64 for kids, and so on. For all the pricing options up to date, you can, of course, check the website here.

You can also purchase tickets for special events, such as Halloween Nights. Even when I was at the park (September 29th), a bigger part of the park was already decorated with the Halloween theme. The ticket for the Halloween nights costs eighteen Euros.

But if you pay attention to the PortAventura Park's website, you can notice several promotions either for groups or for multi – day visits. But generally, the further in advance you book the entrance tickets, the lower the price will be.

In case you are afraid that you will not be able to go on all the attractions in one day because of the crowds, I have some happy news for you – there are Fast Passes available, which will allow you to skip the long lines and get on a desired ride in a few minutes only! There are several options of Fast Passes available, and the cheapest one costs twenty – seven Euros. It allows you to ride each rollercoaster once, so it is quite a good deal, if you ask me.

Before I went to the park, I was looking at different kinds of fast passes, because I thought that the queues will be enormous even during the week, and the most expensive of the Fast Pass options even allows you unlimited rides in first rows on all rides. Pretty awesome, isn't it? Well, it is, but the price of this Fast Pass is almost equal to the price of an entrance ticket. It is up to you to decide whether it is worth it or not.

Also, remember that you cannot buy the fast passes online. You can buy them in the park, at different ticket offices and also at machines next to Dragon Khan rollercoaster.

But the problem with the fast passes is the following: maybe a bigger group of persons decide that buying it is a good idea, and the queue at the fast pass might be even longer than the ordinary one. So keep this in mind when deciding whether to buy the Fast Pass or not.

Roughly, the park opening times are divided in two groups – from 10. 00 to 19. 00 or 20. 00 or from 10. 00 to midnight. It must be awesome to ride rollercoasters there at night! As I said before, different months have different opening times, and there would be too much to write if I wanted to list them all, so if you are interested to know the timetable for a specific day, you can simply check the park website.

Best time to go there

In terms of seasons, the best time is probably autumn, when kids are already at school, which means less crowds. Also, it is not too hot (I think it must be terribly hot at the park in summer). End of September was just perfect – hot enough for a T-shirt and jeans, but still not too hot, and I did not have to use sunscreen.

In terms of days of the week, please choose the weekdays, not weekends. I heard that the queues on weekends can be enormous, and even the Fast Pass option does not help much. I was there on Tuesday, and I did not wait more than five (! ) minutes at any attractions. Even the organized tours mostly only depart during the week. But on the Julia Travel website (where I have booked my tour) I saw that in October and November, they only depart on weekends. Probably not a good idea to go there on weekends even in autumn. Well, or maybe you can give it a try. Who knows, you might be lucky. But I would personally not risk it.

In terms of weather, it is great if you choose a cloudy day. Why? Because, first of all, it is not too hot, and secondly, people will rather stay at home because they are afraid that it will eventually start to rain. Well, when I was in PortAventura, it was raining for like an hour (otherwise, it was a perfect sunny day, with only a few clouds), but all the attractions were working normally. I think that this is great, because, for example, in the Gardaland park in Italy, they close most of the attractions in case of rain.

Also, when it rains, you can go and eat something. Always, when I go to an amusement park on a sunny day, I simply forget to eat, so a little bit of rain is an excellent chance to give your stomach some food. However, the story is different if it rains all day, but I heard that such occasions are very rare here in Spain.

How is the park divided?

The park is divided into several thematic areas. I will describe it only briefly, including my favourite attractions in each area, which I will better describe in addition of this entry. But I would like to point out that this is the best themed amusement park that I have been to so far! They really put a lot of effort in it, and I love it.

So, the first area after the park entrance is Mediterrània. Before you reach the real attractions, you will pass through a real village! It consists of different shops (but sadly, some of them are only open on weekends), and at the end of September, it was already decorated with Halloween decoration– pumpkins and giant spiders on the walls. Luckily, the spiders were not moving, otherwise I would probably turn around and leave the park straight away. Because, you know, women are always scared of spiders, and I am not an exception here.

The first (and for me the only interesting) attraction in Mediterrània is the rollercoaster, called Furious Baco. After it, there is already the next area. But I dare you to go on that rollercoaster, because it is awesome!

What follows the Mediterrània area, is the Polynesia, and here, you can see the real jungle and an appropriate jungle drum music. Here, you can also find the birds show, the 4D cinema (The former Sea Odyssey), and a water attraction, called the Tutuki Splash. Be careful, if you decide to go on this one – leave the electronic devices at the point before you enter the boats, because you will get soaking wet on that ride. In Polynesia, you can also go to the haunted house, themed around the movie REC. The entrance costs five Euros, but I did not dare to go there alone, so I cannot say whether it is good or not. It probably is, but I would not like to have nightmares.

The next area is China, where you can find the best attractions, such as rollercoasters Dragon Khan and Shambhala, and also another water ride (this one is much more peaceful than Tutuki Splash), called Angkor. China is also a place, where you can watch two more shows – bubble show and sand animation. I have seen both, and they are breathtaking. And they are for free!

Mexico was my second favourite area. The best, and definitely the most visible attraction here, is the drop tower, called Hurakan Condor. I was hesitating to go there at first, but then I liked it so much, I went there three more times! But there is not only the Hurakan Condor, that is interesting in the Mexico area. Here, you also have several smaller rollercoaster, for example El Diablo – tren de la mina, and a very interesting mirror maze – Secret of the Mayans.

The next in line is the Far West. Here, only one attraction was interesting enough for me to actually test it – a wooden rollercoaster, called Stampida. Far West hosts a lot of Halloween shows and horror mazes, but sadly, I had no time to see any of them. But considering how awesome the park is, the shows there must be spectacular. In my opinion, the Far West area was made to just walk around, shop and try your luck at the stalls, where you can shoot at various objects and win giant stuffed animals. I really wanted to do it, but then I thought that if I actually won one of those giant animals, how would I take it home?

The last themed area in the park is Sesamo Aventura – Sesame Street, which only has attractions for little kids, so I did not even go there. But kids seem to love it, because I have heard their screams of excitement the whole time.

The Halloween time in the PortAventura park

As I have already mentioned in the 'Tickets' section, the price of a ticket for the Halloween nights is eighteen Euros, and it also includes an entrance fee.

But you do not have to pay for the Halloween ticket to feel the Halloween spirit. There is Halloween decoration everywhere in the park, and there are actors, masked as zombies and vampires, walking around, and they will be glad if you ask them to be on a picture with you!

At this moment, I am seriously considering to go there for the Halloween Nights! I mean, I am working during the week, but maybe it is worth to be without a sleep one night and see an amazing show. Well, I will see, and in case I will go, I will definitely write a detailed report about it, so you will know whether it is worth going or not.

My favourite rides, shows and attractions inside the park

The park is huge, so describing every single attraction in there would not make any sense. And I did not go on all the rides, just to the more intense ones. And some of them were so interesting that I really have to describe them in great details. So, here we go:

Before I went to the park, I made an approximate plan about the order of visiting different rides, because I did not want to go to the most intense rides at the beginning, such as, for example, Hurakan Condor. Well, even if I would want to go there first, it was still closed and I would have to wait.

So my first rollercoaster for that day was a beast, called Furious Baco, situated in the Mediterrània area, very close to the park entrance. This is one of the shortest, but also the most intense rollercoasters that I have ever been to. If you look at it from the distance, you will only see a few twists and turns. What is so special about it then? The answer is – its speed! Furious Baco is known to be the fastest rollercoaster in Europe, which goes from 0 km/h to 135 km/h in just three seconds! Now just try to imagine this acceleration…

Same as in other theme parks, Furious Baco is themed very well. When you get strapped on your seat, the rollercoaster will move a few meters forward, and there is a screen above your head, where they display a cartoon. It tells a story about a man who invented a machine for picking up grapes, and then his pet monkey pressed some wrong button, which made the machine accelerate very fast. As you probably guessed, the rollercoaster is the grape - picking machine in this case. The catch there is, that I was so distracted with the cartoon that I did not even expect the acceleration.

And it was one hell of an acceleration! I was not able to breathe for a few seconds, and then, the most interesting part of the rollercoaster was already over, because I got used to its speed. What follows then, is a few more turns and one upside – down inversion. It might sound boring, but I was shaking for a few minutes after I got off this ride! Most rollercoasters in the park also have cameras installed, and at the end of the ride, you can admire your reactions. My reaction on the Furious Baco was definitely the funniest – as I said, I was not expecting the acceleration and my eyes became so big because of the surprise.

Next in line of my rides on that day was the rollercoaster, called Dragon Khan. It is situated in the China area, with oriental temples and stuff like that. This rollercoaster is visible from almost every point in the park, together with another one, called the Shambhala – expedition to the Himalayas. Dragon Khan is the one that is red. Believe me, when you listen to the sound that this rollercoaster makes in the first loop, it seems to sound like a dragon's roar. When walking through the park for the first time, it took me quite a long time to figure out, where the sound is coming from.

There are four riders in each row, and regardless on where you sit, you will feel a great adrenaline rush. When the rollercoaster climbs up the hill, it does not stop at the top, but it rushes first down a small, and then a big drop, which is so intense that you will probably feel a bit dizzy. At least I did. What follows, is a couple of loops, and a zero – G inversion. At that point, you will feel weightless. At the end, there are a couple more loops. Yes, this rollercoaster was once the one with the most loops in the world!

After Dragon Khan, you can ride the tallest rollercoaster in Europe, which is almost ninety meters high (but it is still not the highest attraction in the park! ) and it is called Shambhala. It has no loops, only a lot of hills, which will make you feel that your stomach came all the way up to your mouth. What is interesting about this rollercoaster, is its harness. The harness here is not the typical one, as you can see on most of other rollercoasters – over the shoulders, but it only goes over your legs. Scary, I know.

I was sure I will just fly out of my seat at some point, but do not worry, it is completely safe, this just adds some points to a greater adrenaline rush. When riding up and waiting for the drop, you can admire the spectacular views of the park, and even of the coast! Or maybe it is better if you do not even look down, because this way, you will realize how high you actually are. And always, when I am riding on a rollercoaster and look down, I start screaming because I know what follows - if I am going up, I will also have to get back down at some point!

I rode Shambhala three times in a row to prepare for the next attraction – the majestic Hurakan Condor drop tower. The theme of the ride are some Mayan ruins and the sacrifice to the god – with the drop, of course. The ride is 330 feet tall, and it is still not the tallest one in the world – but some say it is the greatest, because of its seats. Want to know more? Keep reading! So, at Hurakan Condor, you can choose from three different seats – one of them are seats without a platform – you are almost hanging in the air, one of them are the tilting seats and one of them are ordinary seats.

Please, do yourself a favour and do not sit on the ordinary ones – it is much more fun on the other two. But also way more scary. If you are sitting on the tilting seats (which are pretty uncomfortable, but still totally worth a try), you will have the feeling that you are slipping out of your seat on the way up. The seats climb up very slow. Really very slow. At some point, I thought that we are close to the top already, but then I looked up and noticed that we are not even the halfway up yet! The good thing at Hurakan Condor is, that you can know when to expect the drop. There are cameras at the top, and as soon as you see the flash, you know you will be dropped. So do not keep your eyes closed if you would like to spare yourself the shock.

Also, at the top, the seats are tilted that much that you are almost forced to look down. People down there look like ants. At first, I promised myself that I will not look down, but then I (accidentally) did, and I was lucky to spot an attraction that I was searching before, but could not find it (the Stampida rollercoaster). And then, the drop came. It was much less scary than I imagined. Trust me, the feeling in your stomach is much more intense at the Shambhala rollercoaster. But maybe, the feeling for me would be more intense if I would not ride the Shambhala before the drop tower.

The most fun part of this attraction are definitely the pictures, which you can see after you get off – faces of an absolute terror. I just had to buy one – it cost me 7, 95 €. I rarely buy photos in amusement parks, but the one that you can buy at this ride, actually shows how high in the air you are, so, for me, it was totally worth that money.

After the Hurakan Condor, I decided to try out the attraction that I noticed from up there – a wooden rollercoaster, called Stampida. It has an interesting concept – the rollercoaster consists of two parallel tracks, and you can choose between a blue and a red train. So this is basically like a race – both trains are running next to each other, and the one that reaches the end first, wins. I am sorry to spoil you the possible surprise, but the red train always wins. At least when I watched it, it won about seven times in a row. Not very fair, but who would possibly argue about a rollercoaster, coming to the end and scoring the second place?

Of course, since this rollercoaster is wooden, it does not have any loops, but the ride is intense enough even without being turned upside down. The rollercoaster is very loud and bumpy, and there were several points on the track, when I was expecting that the train will just derail. This is my first wooden rollercoaster that I have been on, and now, I am wondering whether all wooden rollercoasters are that rough. It really was not a pleasant experience for my back. There is also a similar wooden rollercoaster for kids, whose part of the track runs next to Stampida, and it is called Tomahawk, so do not be surprised if you will see a smaller – scale Stampida next to you.

To calm down and let my back relax a little after a bumpy ride, I decided to try out the mirror maze – The secret of the Mayans. Before I went to the park, I did not see any pictures of it, so I thought it is one of those mazes that you see in lunaparks – a few mirrors and an obvious way out. But if I knew how this maze looks like, I would probably take a chalk with me and mark the way back out!

Believe me, the walk through the maze is very trippy because of the colourful visual effects. I had to ask myself several times whether I am really there or I am just dreaming. So I was very happy when I safely reached the exit, about half an hour later! I wonder if the staff comes to rescue you if you are not able to find a way out for a long time. You can check the videos on Youtube – although their quality is not the best because of the dark, you can still see how those visual effects look like.

My next ride was another rollercoaster – El Diablo – Tren de la Mina. I thought that there is no possible way that any other ride in the park can be more rough than Stampida, but I was obviously very wrong. This is another rollercoaster with no loops, and it is also made for smaller kids. The only protection from falling out is a metal bar over your legs. And trust me, it hurts. Or maybe I am just getting old and therefore I am more sensitive. The scene and the theme of this rollercoaster are very interesting, and if the ride was more pleasant, I could say that I like it.

After these two painful experiences, I had to rest a bit (sarcasm alert), so I went on all other rollercoasters again – Furious Baco, Dragon Khan (this one was also quite painful now and my head was bouncing left and right a lot), Shambhala, and then Hurakan Condor. If I could, I would have all those rides in my backyard, because I simply could not get enough of them. If I was living close to this park, I would go there every single day of my life!

Then, after riding the rollercoasters for several times, the feeling in my stomach was not intense that much anymore, so I have decided to see some of the shows, which I heard that are very good. And since it was starting to rain at this point, the timing for seeing the shows was just perfect.

The first one was the Bird show. And I was lucky, I passed by the place where the show was happening, just a few minutes before the start. Honestly, I thought this show is like an exhibition of exotic birds, but I was wrong. Well, it still was like an exhibition, but with a twist.

The guy, which was training the birds, was very funny, and he interacted with the audience a lot. And the show was awesome. The birds were really well trained, and they had some exotic species that I have never heard of before. It is totally worth to see this show, and it is for free. Oh, and it lasts half an hour, which is much longer than I expected.

The next two shows that I saw, were the bubble show and the sand animation. I was one of only a few adults at the bubble show, but even if the show's target audience are probably kids, it was very interesting for me. The guy was doing giant balloons, pretending to blow the balloons with his nose and other funny stuff. I tried to take a couple of pictures, but there was not much light, so this is the best that I could get:

My last show on that day was the Sand Animation. This show was spectacular, and I can sum it up with the following words: a woman was throwing sand in the air, making interesting textures. Also, she was making pictures on the sand, and with great attention to details. Sounds boring? I dare you to go and see this show, and you will definitely change your mind.

Since my visit of the PortAventura park was coming to an end, and I got wet by the rain, I thought why not try out the water rides? So I went on the Tutuki Splash first, and I am glad I left my phone in the bag. The beginning of the ride is calm, you go through a jungle, and then, there is a big hill with a tidal wave splash at the bottom. And if you are sitting in the middle of the boat (just like I did), you receive a big amount of water on your body. At this point, I understood why they were selling raincoats at the beginning of this ride! I did not even look at the price, but I am guessing that they are not cheap.

After getting wet on Tutuki Splash, I went to try out Angkor, which is a nice ride to calm down from the intense rides, but you do not get wet there. Well, excapt maybe a few sprinkles of water, but that would be it. Indeed, this ride is very relaxing, and you will definitely think that you are somewhere in the nature, not in an amusement park. Sadly, this was my last ride for that day, and I had to hurry out of the park to get to the shuttle bus on time.

Eating and drinking

I will sum up my experience with food in the park with one simple word – expensive.

Towards the end of the day, I decided to have an ice cream. Not because I wanted it that much, but because I only had fifty Euro bill with me and I had to change it for smaller notes to be able to take a taxi home when I arrive back to Barcelona. Because, apparently, taxis in Barcelona only give back the change if the total cost of the ride is smaller than twenty Euros. Weird, but I guess I will have to get used to it.

I decided to have an ice cream with the taste of the chewing gum, and it was really good. But I cannot say that for the price – one portion costs 2, 95 €. Oh, come on. But I had no other choice than pay and enjoy the taste. And I had to take a picture of the bill to show it to my flatmates, otherwise they would probably not believe me.

There are several restaurants inside the park – you have at least two in each themed area. But some of them are only open on weekends, and I cannot even imagine how crowded they must be. So if you visit the park during the week, you will most likely have only a little choice about where to eat, in case you did not bring any food with you.

Let me tell you more about the prices, so you will be prepared. When walking through the park, I was looking at the menus of each opened restaurant, and I was amazed in a negative way – the cheapest meal was a child menu in a fast food restaurant, consisting of a burger, french fries and coke, and it cost ten Euros. 'Adult' portions were fifteen Euros or more. No, thanks. And, by the way, how can you even go on a rollercoaster after eating junk food? I have never felt like I am going to throw up on a rollercoaster, not even after eating a sandwich, but I most likely would, after eating such a huge portion of greasy food.

Internet access, photos on the rides and selfie sticks

Luckily (or sadly), the WiFi connection is available throughout the PortAventura park, and you do not have to pay for it. Why sadly? Because I saw simply too many people, being on their phones instead enjoying the rides. But well, I guess that we live in such an era that I should just get used to it.

To get the free connection, you have to turn the WiFi on your phone on, and then search for PortAventura Free WiFi. There are several other connections available, but they either belong to restaurants or to the resorts in the park, so you cannot access the network through them. After you click on it, you have to register on the website – you have to write your name, surname, e – mail, date of birth, country and post code. Then you can start browsing.

Obviously, the connection is not equally good at every spot in the park, but in general, the internet speed is good. With my phone, the best connection was between Shambhala and Dragon Khan rollercoasters, and the worst in the Polynesia area.

As in every other amusement park, PortAventura also offers you an option to buy photos of your scared face on the rides. Even better, most rollercoasters there even have a camera, so you can see the video. They also have the so – called Photo Pass available, which costs about twenty Euros, and allows you to have a photo of every bigger ride in the park, put on the USB drive (that you get for free with it).

Also, you can choose your photo to be printed on mugs, T – shirts, keychains and other nonsense. Buying a single photo will cost you about eight Euros. It is not much, considering that the photos are almost the size of the A4 paper, comparing them to, for example, a photo from the drop tower in a Gardaland amusement park in Italy, where the photo is maybe the size of half a postcard.

What I found both very sad and ridiculous at the same time, is the sign that I saw in front of every roller coaster: selfie sticks are forbidden on every ride. Come on, people, can't you enjoy a ride that lasts less than one minute, without taking selfies? This is why they have cameras on every ride, so you do not have to take your own pictures! I wonder how many people actually tried to do that before they decided to put the signs there. Or maybe I do not even want to know.

The staff

Surprisingly, most of the staff in the park speaks English quite well. I did not interact much with them, because I was able to orientate inside the park by myself (well, with the help of a park map that I printed out at home). But on most rides, when they were checking if we are seated properly and our harnesses are safely adjusted, they were joking with passengers a lot.

For example, the woman on Shambhala said that even if you die on the ride because of fear, the harness is strong enough that you will arrive to the end in one piece. This was before I went on that rollercoaster for the first time, so I was even more scared than I would normally be. But it is a great idea to put some of the tension away.

Where to store your belongings?

Personally, I would not advise you to bring too much stuff with you. After all, you do not even need a lot of stuff. So this is what I did. I put a phone, some money, the keys and my ID into a money belt. It is good that they do allow money belts on all rides. And before you strap up on the ride, you can leave your backpack in wardrobes next to the rollercoaster (or whatever ride you are going on), and the staff will take care that nobody can take your stuff. Sadly, this is not available at Stampida, which is a bit strange, and during the ride, I was not sure whether to hold on for dear life or hold my bag.

Also, there are lockers available at several places inside the park, and they cost five Euros per day, but not many people seemed to use them.

Conclusion

For the end of this quite long entry, I would like to give you the following advices:

1. Do not go on rollercoasters when it rains. It will feel like someone is stabbing needles in your face and eyes. And I could not reach my face because of the harness – it was so painful.
2. Try to go on Furious Baco and Dragon Khan early in the morning, because after a while, these rollercoasters seem to get 'tired' and the ride will be very painful.
3. There is a 'single rider' option, which allows you to access the attraction much faster – when queuing, just stand in the one that says 'single rider'. I really do not understand people who want to sit together on rollercoasters and then complain if they are not in the same row. Come on, will the ride be any less intense if you sit on the other side than your friend?
4. And the last, but also the most important advice: just go to this park and enjoy like a little kid. You will definitely forget about all your worries there.

After listing so many positive and awesome things about PortAventura, I really had to think whether there is a single negative thing or experience that I had, related to this park, or not. And I have only found one, which is not even directly related to my experience inside the park. The problem is that if you contact the park on their website, they are not responding to e - mails.

At least I have not received a response yet. I have contacted them twice before I went to the park, because I had some questions about certain services there, and after not receiving a reply for a few days, I wrote them another e - mail, because I thought that the previous one was not sent. And I am still waiting for a reply. But honestly, this downside is almost not worth mentioning.

And please remember that once you go to PortAventura, you will want to go back again and again! I am already choosing the date for my next trip there...