It’s Barcelona, but not as you know it

Balancing a dose of Vitamin D with an adrenaline rush, Emily Shelley takes her family to Spain’s PortAventura World

Half a million Brits fly to Barcelona every year and don’t see anything of the city and its famous architecture. And no, they’re not on stag dos... they’re heading straight to the No 1 leisure destination in the Mediterranean – PortAventura World. This collection of theme parks and hotels, with a water park, a beach club and new attractions every year, is second only to Disneyland Paris on the European visitor leaderboard.

It has the same attention to detail and focus on family as Disney, with the added benefit of the Barcelona weather.

There are five themed hotels to choose from, each with pools and gardens. We’re staying in a US frontier town from the late 19th Century called Sullivan City, home of Hotel Gold River.

Here, visitors can sleep in the town’s “jail” and eat in its “opera house”, while dodging sky-high cacti and jigging along to piped cowboy music. Our room is in Callaghan’s – a smart boarding house building around the central square.

Hotel guests get Express passes to the theme parks included in their ticket, so if you can tear yourself away from the beautiful “desert river” swimming pools around the hotel, it’s a short walk across a footbridge to the main park entrance.

Express means just that – no queues for any rides. This is worth its weight in frontier gold if you’ve small children with you. It also opens up so many more rides than you’d ever usually have time for, and gives you the space to watch a show and stop for lunch.

While you can find the usual themepark fare of burgers and chips here, this is Spain, so we sit down to tapas and fresh seafood by the “harbour”.

It strikes us how much has been done to make sure there is something to appeal to every member of the family – from grandparents who can enjoy theatre shows and gentle boat rides, to teens seeking the biggest thrills on the continent, and toddlers who are so often forgotten by these kinds of attractions.

With that in mind, here are the top 10 things you must do in PortAventura World...

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1. ZOOM THROUGH SESAME STREET

New for the 2019 season is Street Mission, a “dark ride” in a Sesame Street taxi. You can ride it with a one-year-old, but our teenage daughter also thinks this is one of the best experiences in the park. Put on 3D glasses and use a laser gun to shoot cookies for Cookie Monster as you zoom around a part-real/partCGI Sesame Street, with enough twists, turns and fake falls to give everyone a surprise. And the biggest thrill of all? Realising you’ve beaten your dad on the cookie leaderboard on the way out.

2. ACCELERATE TO 180MPH IN FIVE SECONDS

One of the theme parks on offer is Ferrari Land, a smart Italian-themed collection of driving and speed-based rides. As well as sampling awesome pasta here, you must experience the Red Force – which has a minimum height requirement of 1.4 metres. This vertical

The runway mine train, El Diablo, has enough thrills to keep the kids happy without terrifying Mum

accelerator ride can be seen for miles around as it rises to 112m high, and you know it’ll be fast when they hand you goggles as you climb in. Once you’ve been shot up this tower like a bullet from a gun, it’s up to gravity and wind speed – you’ll go all the way over the top or fall backwards to where you started.

3. DRIVE A FERRARI

OK, not a real Ferrari. But on various simulators, you can drive a Ferrari round the world, an F1 version around Monte Carlo and a real-life go-cart Ferrari in a race against the kids. In Ferrari Land, there’s also a kids’ version of the Red Force accelerator and a large play area.

4. SLIDE DOWN THE HIMALAYAS

The Shambhala ride in the “China”