Quick PortAventura questions for very last minute trip

[Shaggy_Dog_]

Thanks to the Ryanair flash sale today (tickets from £12.99) I’ve just bagged a solo trip to Barcelona in a few days time. This will be my first trip to Portaventura and I’m trying to work out a few things.

I’m looking at the hotels and I see they have Hotel El Paso available for €137 for 1 night which includes admission to both parks. But there is also their “Affiliated” hotel Villa Centric which is a 40 minute walk away from the park and is €75 for “Bed and breakfast with tickets”. Does anyone know if this definitely includes both park tickets as that seems very cheap? And are the park tickets for the day of your hotel stay or can you stay in the hotel the night before and use the tickets the next day if that makes sense?

Also I’ll only have one day at the park and intend on buying Unlimited Fastpass. The park is open from 10:00 to 18:00 and Ferrari Land from 16:00 to 20:00. Any tips on what order to tackle the rides and what ones maybe aren’t worth bothering with?

 

[Leigh]

If you’re at an affiliated hotel for 1 night, you get a single day ticket that you can use on either day to get in to both parks (on the same day).

If you’re staying on site, your room key will get you in to the park on both days (although admission to Ferrari Land is only on one of those days). Be warned, El Paso unlike most of the hotels isn’t directly attached to the park so you won’t get to use the hotel entrances.

If you have unlimited express pass, you should be prioritising the rides that aren’t on it that you want to do - my suggestion is probably Uncharted first thing (which is a lot easier from Gold River/Lucy/Colorado Creek as the hotel entrance is right next to it), providing it doesn’t open late. For a little while they were doing ERT for hotel guests on Uncharted too but I’m not sure if that’s still going.

Ferrari land; if you get there for rope drop and go on Red Force immediately via the SRQ you’ll be fine. There’s nothing else really worth bothering with except Junior Red Force if you want the cred.

 

[Shaggy_Dog_]

If you’re at an affiliated hotel for 1 night, you get a single day ticket that you can use on either day to get in to both parks (on the same day).

Thanks, that’s exactly the information I was looking for, I’ve gone with Hotel El Paso as it will give me effectively two days at the park.

Seems a bit disappointing though that Uncharted isn’t included in the Express Pass Unlimited nor is Hurakon Condor. What is the best strategy for doing Condor? It’s one of the rides I’m most looking forward to, though I’ve heard it can really have some issues with only some of the sides being available.

 

[Leigh]

Seems a bit disappointing though that Uncharted isn’t included in the Express Pass Unlimited nor is Hurakon Condor. What is the best strategy for doing Condor? It’s one of the rides I’m most looking forward to, though I’ve heard it can really some issues with only some of the sides being available.

Condor, for whatever reason, has been being used for a trial of a completely separate Reserve and Ride system that’s free to use, although I’m not sure if it’s still active this season.

If the Reserve and Ride system is still active then I’d obviously try that, but if not you can pick up one shots for it.

 

[Skyscraper]

What is the best strategy for doing Condor? It’s one of the rides I’m most looking forward to, though I’ve heard it can really some issues with only some of the sides being available.

Just be warned, both the sit down and standup floorless sections are fed from the same queue, and on busy days they do not accept requests. So if you only want to do the standup side be aware you may be forced to do sit-down, and vice versa.