When you come to Benidorm, particularly if you have children in tow, you make a list of things to do and places to visit. Number one has to be the beach - and with the beautiful sandy beaches on offer it keeps them fairly happy. But once the novelty has worn off you plan what to do next. The five big daytime attractions are Aqualandia Water Park, Mundomar Marine Park, Terra Natura Wildlife Park, Aqua Natura and Terra Mitica theme park - you certainly won´t be bored and it´s not obligatory to have young ones with you either!

This years ticket

Terra Mitica theme park is now under the management of the Aqualandia group - having passed through many hands over the years. Aqualandia originally acquired rights over Terra Mitica in 2011 on a rental basis but last year (2012) they paid 65 million euros to become major stake holders in the theme park - 45 million of that covered debts that the park had! The park is now fully in the hands of private investors, with Aqualandia being the majority share holder with just 70% of the total.

Last years entrance prices

Last years entrance price was 35 euros for an adult and 26.50 for a child - so I was somewhat pleasantly surprised that the prices appeared to have been reduced this year to 29 euros and 22 euros. With one of the many discount vouchers available around the resort giving up to 10 euros off the adult price and 8 euros off the child price it seemed like finally someone was thinking of increasing footfall by bringing down the price. Generally the Spanish mentality is if income/profits are down then put the price up - which in reality actually makes the situation even worse as less people will end up going. A prime example of this are the toll roads here in Spain - toll price goes up so less people use it...

Pay machines to purchase your tokens

However, as I gave a hint, all is not quite what it seems at Terra Mitica. The entrance ticket does not give you access to all rides in the park - you now have to pay extra on top to go on some of them and even to watch some of the shows! There is absolutely NO mention of this on their website - which I double checked yesterday and it is not even clear when you enter the park. The leaflet and map you pick up just states "free access" to Iberia Park failing to mention anywhere that rides have to be paid for - they have however not forgotten to include a Russian translation for everything.


"Iberia Park" is to the left as you enter and you can get into that part of the park without having to purchase an entrance ticket. However, all the rides within this section of the park have to be paid for - even if you do have an entrance ticket! There is no other access into this part of the park except at the very beginning.
 You cannot pay in cash at the rides but have to hand over "Ibero´s" - which is what they have called the currency at Terra Mitica.

There are machines where you can buy them from - basically 1 euro buys you 1 ibero - but once you start buying 10 euros worth you get an extra 1 ibero and changing 50 euros gives you an extra 15... obviously a ploy to "encourage" you to change more as you get a bonus! Im not sure if you can cash them back at the end if you have any unspent ones but it probably wouldn´t surprise me if you couldn´t.

I am truly baffled as to why they have done this - well it´s obvious in one respect ... they think that they will make more money. But as far as I know it is still under the same management company, so why charge for certain parts of the park and not others? Is this a trial for next year perhaps to charge for all rides I wonder!

Price list for Iberia Park

But to charge 7 "ibero´s" to go and watch the Pirates of the Caribbean show is rather expensive. Can you imagine the cost if you are a family with two or three children - and there is no discount for them either.  I really don´t think that this is a smart move and can foresee visitor numbers falling to this part of the park. Most visitors that arrive will automatically purchase an entrance ticket believing it will give them access to all the rides within the park - I am not aware of any other theme park ie Alton Towers, Chessington, Disney working this way.

Another thing which caught my eye is the price of the water... this year they are charging 3 euros for a half litre bottle - I am fairly certain that last year it was half that at 1.50 euro. That´s some rate of inflation!

So if you are planning on a visit to the theme park just be aware beforehand - I haven´t seen it advertised or promoted in any of the papers... I wonder why! And make sure that you take you own bottle of water - its 20 cents in Mercadona.

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