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More than 3 million visitors for PortAventura Aquatic
In 2002, seven years after its inauguration, PortAventura officially passed from the status of a theme park to the one of a resort with the opening of two on-site hotels and one of the largest waterparks in Spain: Costa Caribe. Now known as PortAventura Aquatic Park, it has just celebrated its tenth anniversary and welcomed more than 3 million of visitors!
Initially developed by Forrec on behalf of Universal Parks & Resorts (which owned the resort at that time before selling its shares to the Caixa bank in 2004), PortAventura Aquatic Park is strategically located a few steps from the main entrance of PortAventura and now covers an area of 34 hectares (approx 84 acres).
With a theming inspired by the Caribbean islands, it offers to visitors a dozen of water rides divided between an indoor and an outdoor zone. Attractions include 7 water slides manufactured by ProSlide (including a MAMMOTH™ with 5-persons rafts), 2 water playgrounds for children delivered by WhiteWater (AquaPlay ™ series), a large wave pool, a lazy river covering both zones, a solarium, several jacuzzis and swimming pools, a shop and 6 snacks / restaurants.
PortAventura Aquatic Park is open on average during 3 and a half months in the year (there will be 109 days of operations in 2012) and, as for the theme park, is mostly visited by Spanish (70% of the global attendance) followed by foreign tourists, in which are headed the French and the Russians! All guests staying in one of the four on-site hotels automatically have access to the water park in their package while daily visitors can also buy seperate ticket or a combo ticket with PortAventura.
An expansion project is in the works for several years, but has been delayed due to the difficulties encountered by PortAventura at the beginning of the financial crisis. Additional space of thirty hectares is indeed available for future developments on the current parking lot.
PortAventura Resort is one of the largest attractions resorts in Europe with more than 3.5 million visitors these past years. For this season, it has invested more than €25 million (approx $30.7 million) for the opening of Shambhala, Europe’s tallest roller coaster (see our article below). The company is currently owned by the investor group Investindustrial associated with Caixa.
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