Tag: water parks

What’s with all the hype about Benidorm, Spain?

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When your holiday in Benidorm starts off with views like this, you know you're going to have a great one!

When your holiday in Benidorm starts off with views like this, you know you’re going to have a great one!

Not content to let an entire summer go by without once leaving your home city for a little fun in the sun, you have been aggressively searching last minute deals for a getaway in sunny Spain before it is too late.

After spending several days compiling options that captured your attention, you believe you have finally found a worthy contender. You have been looking into booking an all inclusive hotel in Benidorm, but you want to be sure that the surrounding destination is legit before committing a week long holiday there to your credit card statement.

The following highlights will ensure that you are entertained during the duration of your holiday in Benidorm, which is one of the foremost resort towns on the Costa Blanca, as they have long been favorites of repeat visitors to the region.

Enjoy the cleanliness of Benidorm’s blue flag beaches

Enjoy a dip in the ocean as much as the next person, but recoil at the idea of diving headlong into a breaker and coming up covered in all sorts of plastic trash? Prefer to not catch rays surrounding by tons of loose refuse, blowing around aimlessly across its neglected sands?

It was concerns like this that prompted the founding of the Blue Flag beach program, which recognizes seaside paradises around the world for the quality of their water and the cleanliness of the shore that fronts it.

Benidorm has two popular beaches that meet this program’s stringent criteria, one of which is favored by the party-hearty crowd, while the other is better suited to families and is favored by the locals.

Stay cool and get your adrenaline fix at the same time

If jumping in the ocean doesn’t appeal to you, or if you pine for something a bit more exciting than just a seashore, than spending a day at Aqualandia is allow to you to cool your jets and get your adrenaline fix all in one efficient package.

Those who are continually on the lookout for the best thrill rides out there will love Vertigo, which is the world’s highest enclosed slide in the world, and with nineteen other rides that range from kamikaze drops to rapids, there is plenty of other wet attractions at Aqualandia that will satisfy you until park closing.

Paint the town red in the heart of the Costa Blanca

With 800 bars scattered throughout the streets of Benidorm, there is an alcohol-serving venue here that will meet your needs … you just have to come find it! Irish pubs, sports bars, nightclubs, and Spanish-style cafeteria bars all await you here, and with many serving brews that rarely cost more than €1 per bottle, your biggest concern will be drinking enough water to stave off the inevitable headache the following morning.

5 Fun Things to Do in Tenerife

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If you are an active person, hiking up Mount Teide will certainly be one of the fun things to do in Tenerife!

If you are an active person, hiking up Mount Teide will certainly be one of the fun things to do in Tenerife!

For generations, the Canary Islands have been a getaway for those fleeing from the stressors in their lives, if only for a week or two. Some have managed to settle here permanently, but for those of us who haven’t the resources to live in permanent exile from bosses, bad weather, and irritating in-laws, we need to make the most of the time that we have in this idyllic sub-tropical islands.

Fortunately for you, time to get away from these inconvenient but necessary burdens is close at hand, so you have been researching Tenerife flights in order to make your (temporary) escape official. While some time on beaches like Playa de Las Teresitas is definitely in order, you don’t want your holiday to go by in a blur while you bake away on a sun lounger.

Indeed, the best breaks are defined by moments of discovery and excitement, and so you wonder: what fun things to do in Tenerife will achieve this goal? It offers plenty, and the list of potential adventures below is but the tip of the iceberg.

1) Go on a trek up Mount Teide

Did you know the highest mountain in Spain is not on the Iberian peninsula, where 99.9% of its territory is situated, but is instead on Tenerife? Before we got into the travel business, neither did we. Being of volcanic origin, Tenerife was built up in dramatic fashion by a hotspot in the Earth’s crust, resulting in Mount Teide, the dizzyingly high peak that has shot up from the placid Atlantic Ocean, to the alpine elevation that its summit is at today.

You could take the gondola up, but what fun would that be? Don’t forget winter coats and sweaters for the climb, as the peak tops out at 3,700 metres above sea level, putting the temperature at the summit at about 5-7 degrees Celsius in the summer, and below zero in the winter. The beach below will feel extra warm when you get back from this adventure.

2) Cool off and find thrills at Siam Park

If you’d rather thrill seek by slipping down steep water slides rather than freezing your buns off, then spending a day at Siam Park will help you fulfill this desire. A water park that was designed based on the exotic architecture of Thailand (and was even opened by one of the princesses of its Royal Family), Siam Park has the largest collection of Thai architecture in one spot in the world outside the Southeast Asian country, has slides that include racers, plunge slides, bowls, and rapid rides. The food concession even serves Thai food in a full-fledged dedication to its theme!

3) Play a solid 18 holes at Golf del Sur

Tenerife has plenty of raw beauty to gawk at everywhere you look, which must have made the first duffer to grace its shores dream about opening a course here. Well, golf has certainly found its way here in the present day, with Golf del Sur, one of the best courses on the island, standing ready to challenge your ball control skills.

4) Learn how to kitesurf at El Medano

Are you the time that likes to try and pick up new sports in your free time? If this describes you, then why not give the uber exciting adrenaline sport of kitesurfing a try while on Tenerife? El Medano is one of the world’s best places to practice this relatively new discipline, as strong and consistent winds combine with sheltered waters to create the perfect environment for a kite rookie to learn the sport in.

5) Catch a show at the ultra modern Auditorio de Tenerife

If all this physical activity has you worn out at this point, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll have to resign yourself to the beach for the rest of your holiday. In 2003, the Auditorio de Tenerife, with its daring late modernist design, opened its doors to lovers of the performing arts, hosting musical festivals, stage shows, galas, award shows, and much more.

There is a consistent schedule of performers/groups putting on shows and productions, so check when you arrive to see if there is an offering that might appeal to you.