Ferrari Land, July 2024

We joined the melee at the PortAventura Park entrance in preparation for the gates to open to Ferrari Land. It’s an add-on park, well not really a park, more like an upcharge area of PortAventura Park with odd opening hours.

But anyway, 3:30 we were standing at the park entrance to get in, and on the other side of the main gates there was probably another queue of people doing the same.

I’m not sure if resort and park guests get in earlier, but the app said 4pm and I’m sure it’s supposed to open at 5pm, but we were there, primed and ready to sprint over to Red Force. And we did exactly that. We ran as soon as we were through the gates in the blistering heat, following the other sheep doing exactly the same.

We made it. We had a decent spot in the queue, with about a 30-minute wait. Looking back at everyone in the cattle pens one and two, who probably had a 2 hour wait ahead of them. We were counting the minutes until our first ride on the tallest coaster in Europe: Red Force.

The ride was opened and operational on time. They’d had all day to prepare, but even still, there was a staff member cleaning the walls of the station queue area. Surely this is a pre-opening task???

It was an awesome ride though. One of the most fun coasters we’ve ever been on. I loved it, our 10-year-old Evan loved it. Such a fun, thrilling experience, and after the initial shock of the launch, we laughed all the way around.

If you don’t know Red Force, it’s a 367-foot Intamin launched coaster, towering over Ferrari Land and visible from afar, including from the airport so you know where you’re headed when you land in Reus. It’s just massive and themed as a Ferrari F1 race car, with a bright red track and giant Ferrari logos. It even has a grandstand at the side where spectators can watch the launch. If you can’t get to the USA to ride Kingda Ka, then this is your next best alternative.

What a great way to start your afternoon though. We’d also bought Express Passes for just myself and Evan to make sure we got on without any fuss, but as our ‘Run straight to Red Force’ plan was a success, we had another ride in our pockets for later.

After calming down and checking out our Red Force picture, we regrouped with Jo and Elliott. Jo, not into big coasters was a definite ‘No’ for Red Force and Elliott’s too small, though I’m sure he’d love to try it. So, time to explore and see what else this park has to offer. Not much, to be honest…

So, you’ve got Red Force, the only thing worth visiting for. If you’re a coaster cred hunter or just have little kids, then you have Junior Red Force (which is yellow?!), a little SBF Visa junior coaster that was really rough. Elliott laughed while on it but vowed to never ride it again, and the rest of us didn’t enjoy it at all.

Thrill Towers are a pair of S&S Shot and Drop Towers, which we did one of (didn’t realise you could do both on your Express pass, but never mind). Once you’ve been on Hurakan Condor though, they’re a little bit… meh.

The rest of the rides are mainly kids rides, so Elliott was pretty happy and had plenty to do. There are a few spinning rides (one cars – Champions Race, one planes – Flying Race), an F1 themed Whip ride (Junior Championship) which we all enjoyed, a kids fall/bounce tower (err, Kids Tower) and a pendulum ride called Crazy Pistons (Needed to be over 1.4 for this, but it was pretty tame and slow).

Maranello Grand Prix was a fun little powered go-kart race around a track where you get to control the car. The track and buildings all looked great, but these rides are always a pain to control. Evan enjoyed it however.

The only other attractions in the park were ‘Flying Dreams & ‘Racing Legends’ but they weren’t really worth waiting for….

Now we love a good flying theatre ride. Soarin’ is pretty fun over at Epcot, and Mythica at Legoland Windsor is our fave, but Flying Dreams was just a bit naff. After a long and boring queue (even with a fast pass you have to wait) you enter a long and boring pre-show. Leading to a very dull flying theatre ride following some Ferraris around different scenes. Definitely not a ride you’d need to rush back to. And because Elliott loves Mythica, he really wanted to go on it, so we had to pay €5 each for him & Jo to Express Pass with us. Not the best use of €10.

And then there’s Racing Legends which was an even worse simulator ride. A longer wait (again with an Express Pass) and an even longer and more boring pre-show, to be presented with a bad, dated looking driving simulator featuring classic Ferraris. Honestly, Play Gran Turismo on a PS1 in a rocking chair for more thrills and better graphics. Both of these rides take space that could be used for better attractions.

Rides aside, there’s also a few shows, but we didn’t have enough time to catch these.

We had an Express Pass, so we did a second lap on Red Force after lunch. Queue was about an hour and a half, and we walked straight past it, right into the station. Express Pass was definitely worth it if Red Force is your goal and you don’t want the long wait.

We asked if we could do front row, and the staff member was kind enough to let us! Cheers, fella! Much appreciated. So, with our fancy race googles on, we took our front seat and launched 367ft in the air again. Front row was awesome, and we were happy to pay €25 for our picture and video.

There’s a few sit-down restaurants at Ferrari land, but we didn’t have time to explore and eat at them. We’d missed our evening meal at the hotel so just grabbed hot dogs and drinks from The Paddock fast food stand. They had the usual burgers and hot dogs, fries, meal deals, beer, soft drinks and water, so there was plenty to choose from and prices were reasonable too.

If you’re planning on buying anything from Ferrari Land, you might want to get a loan first. We needed a magnet (as you do) and Evan wanted a Red Force t-shirt and Elliott just wanted…. anything, so we went to the gift shop. HOW MUCH????

We’d already picked up magnets from PortAventura park for about €5 each, but a Ferrari Land/Red Force magnet was €12. Twelve Euros for a skinny magnet!!!

I looked at a Red Force t-shirt that was €50. Madness. Then Evan spotted a Ferrari hat that he liked. €80. EIGHTY EUROS FOR A HAT! Mental. Kids tops, pens and pencils, everything was overpriced, so it was just the magnet begrudgingly. No need at all for such markups on theme park merchandise just because it was Ferrari.

We bought our passes for me and Evan form the hotel for €30 each, mainly for Red Force, but also so we could say we did everything we could in the one evening we were there, and we could experience 4 other attractions as part of it. As I’ve said previously, Express Passes are cheaper at the hotel ticket machines than they are online or in the parks. A Ferrari Land pass will give you access to Red Force, Maranello Grad Prix, Thrill Towers (I think you get both, it was marked twice on our pass), Flying Dreams and Racing Legends. Not a bad price at €32 if you only get one evening there and you want to do all the main attractions. The individual attraction passes were €5 each which we got 2 of for Flying Dreams as Elliott wanted to go on and the queue was 40 mins. Not worth it overall and especially now knowing how disappointing this ride is.

I’d be reluctant to buy the full Express Pass if we went again as we found only Red Force was worth riding. So a Red Force only pass would have been better value at €15 each. Should have just bought 2 each of those and had extra goes on it. You live and learn.

We’d done pretty much everything, seen some Ferraris and lapped the park, and it was nearing closing time, so there was only one thing left to do: Jump in the queue for a night ride on Red Force.

We probably waited around 30-40 minutes, but it was so worth it for a night ride. Experiencing that thrill one last time and enjoying the amazing scenery of Salou at night from 300 feet in the air was awesome. We were on row 4 for this ride and it was a bit rougher than the other rides we’d done, but not bad enough to spoil it. And nowhere near Furius Baco level rough.

And with that our time at Ferrari land was over. We walked back towards PortAventura Park, checking out a few more fancy Ferraris as we went before arriving back at Mediterranea just in time to grab a beer, some cheese toasties and watch the parade.

Not sure how much it usually costs to get into Ferrari Land as it was included in our holiday package, allowing us one day access to Ferrari Land. It’s odd though, if you book 3 days at a hotel you only get one day at Ferrari Land, stay a week and you still only get one day! Might be better if it was 1 visit for every 3 days or something similar. I would have definitely liked to get a few more rides in on Red Force. Awesome coaster.

Overall, I didn’t think Ferrari Land is worth it. Red Force, yes, but Ferrari Land, no. The whole park feels like a small land that should be part of the main park and definitely not an extra gate.

The whole land would be better if they got rid of the Ferrari branding, it makes no difference. Red Force would still be Red Force, just without Ferrari logos. It could just be ‘Racing World’ and could probably cut the cost of all merch by 50%, have it as part of the park and open all day. It’d definitely improve ride capacity at PortAventura Park, and Shambhala, Red Force and Furius Baco might not have the big queues so often.

Would we visit again? Yes, but only to ride Red Force. Nothing else was interesting enough.