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What is the Jungle Park in Tenerife officially?
The Jungle Park in Tenerife is self-described as the only true jungle in Europe, with wild vegetation that's home to 500 or 300 animals, depending on which page on the website you're looking at. Let's call it 400.
Birds, primates, big cats, penguins, and reptiles are among the Tenerife animal park's residents, which can be found in enclosures resembling the habitats they'd choose in the wild.
As well as seeing the animals in their pens, you can also watch some of them showing off their skills and talents in 3 shows: a birds of prey show, an exotic bird show, and a sea lion show.
For anyone who wants a little more interaction than glancing at animals from afar, there's the Passport Experience. This add-on lets you get up close and personal with some animals in the park for the chance to feed and touch them.
If that's still not enough interaction for you at this Tenerife zoo, there's also the sea lion encounter. As part of this extra, you'll get to swim with sea lions in the main pool and have your picture taken with one.
Add into the mix several fast food restaurants, plenty of photography spots, and a souvenir shop and you've got a fun day out for everyone in the family.
What is the Jungle Park in Tenerife really?
I can see why they would opt for the more ambitious title of "Jungle Park" over the original "Parque las Águilas" (Eagle Park in English).
Jungle Park does sound more impressive. Although by the dictionary's definition, the park barely qualifies as a jungle. Note that the Jungle Park logo used for all Jungle Park Tenerife promotions is dominated by a lion. Yet there are none in the park.
After paying the entry fee after a long queue, which you can skip if you book in advance, you're sent straight into the gift shop. Then it's into another queue (whether you like it or not) to have your photo taken with a variety of birds in a variety of poses. These, as you can probably guess, will be available to purchase later on.
The park is set in a large woodland area, so you're never very far from shade and there are plenty of signs to stop you walking around in circles. You'll also find a few hidden extras, like peacocks strutting about and opportunities to feed some of the animals. At the cost of €2, of course.
For hilarious results, sprinkle emu food on the shoulders of your loved ones. It'll make for a great photo.
The animal enclosures, while not in a state of disrepair, are not all at their best. Different animals seemed to have different accommodation standards.
So while the orangutans had an awesome-looking setup (not that they looked very happy about it) the penguins and the sea lions drew the short straws.
All the shows ran on time and this is where you'll be glad you bought your sun hat and sun cream, since there's very little chance of a shady spot in the show venues.
Unless you opt to sit in the restaurant. How very devious of them.
There is also a toboggan run called "Bob" which carries a €4 charge and, strangely enough, doesn't start at the top of the hill, like you might expect.
Ian's Jungle Park in Tenerife review
Oddly, upon arrival and whilst standing in the entrance queue, I saw what was arguably the most impressive enclosure right at the beginning.
It must have been designed for one of the big cats, but now holds deer-type creatures. "That's a bit naff," I thought. Unless they're live prey for the big Siberian Tiger. This is gonna get messy!
How silly of me - you can't expose young children to anything like that. It literally is a whole family of Bambis happily eating breakfast in their oversized surroundings.
So, no tigers or lions anymore? I say "anymore", because if you look at the signs in the park, you can see where the word "Lions" has been scratched off. A bit sad and a bit worrying as to the reason behind their disappearance. Did they escape?
The birds of prey show is impressive and claims to be one of the best shows in the world. That's not for me to judge.
But if you want to get really close to the massive birds, sit under one of the perches dotted around the arena. Just don't open a bag of Wotsits during the show.
The exotic bird show is also very good and if you visit Jungle Park Tenerife on a quiet day, everybody in the crowd gets to interact with them.
The penguin feeding is as dull as you can imagine. And the sea lion show is very dated, with the whole resuscitation act cringe-worthy.
This was slightly redeemed by the trainers who were positioned on land in front of the glass swimming pool getting the sea lion to dance with hand gestures.
This isn't the forum to debate whether or not animals should be kept in captivity. I would never refer to Jungle Park Tenerife as a Tenerife zoo.
But the park kept going on about saving the animals and asking for my help to protect the planet. This seemed like empty words and I saw no practical examples of what they're doing to improve the animals' situations.
To rate Jungle Park Tenerife is rather difficult without comparing it to what I've previously experienced. In my opinion, families with young children seeing these types of animals for the first time will benefit greatly.
For me, it was a good day out and well worth the ticket price (with the generous resident discount and promo rate, of course). And attempting the Jungle Hunt adventure trail in flip flops is stupid but awesome fun.
Overall rating: ⅗
Nicky's Jungle Park in Tenerife review
I'm not big on most attractions with animals, so it's no real surprise that Jungle Park Tenerife isn't for me. While some of the enclosures seemed adequately roomy, with enough to keep the animals entertained, the majority of them weren't.
Walking around and seeing animals looking bored, eager to escape, or just downright miserable was quite upsetting and made me want to get out of there pretty sharpish. But wanting to review this Tenerife animal park honestly, we carried on.
The animals taking part in the shows looked happy and well cared for. The birds were free to fly around pretty much for as long as they liked and the sea lions looked like they were having fun jumping and diving.
Thinking back on it, the shows were the highlight of our visit. (Assuming I can't count the stray cat I found right at the beginning. Petting him was my favourite part.) Looking at the other animals in their enclosures seemed to be little more than a time-filler.
If you went to Jungle Park Tenerife 20+ years ago, you might remember a great big aviary you walked into and fed all kinds of tropical birds with cups of nectar.
Just like the tiger enclosure that used to be at the entrance, the aviary has gone, too. There is a walk-in enclosure with a few lemurs. But since you can't feed them, they're not interested in interacting and just do their own thing.
I haven't got the best navigational skills, but I swear that the park has been updated and switched about a bit since the maps were printed. Several times I marched us off somewhere and ended up ducking and diving, pushing great big bushes out of the way, totally expecting someone to yell at me and tell me I wasn't meant to be there.
Thankfully, that never happened. And we never got lost more than a handful of times within 5 hours of me holding the map. Something I'm treating as a victory.
We visited during spring half-term and the Tenerife zoo was surprisingly empty. Whether that's because it's not particularly popular or because it's large enough to cater for a lot of visitors, I'm not sure. But I never once felt like we were stuck in a crowd and we never struggled for seats at a show.
Because of the size and condition of some of the enclosures, the behaviour of the animals, and the general feel that Jungle Park Tenerife is somewhat on its last legs, I wouldn't recommend it. Your time is better spent at Mariposario del Drago if you want animals.
Overall rating: ⅖
Insider tips for the Jungle Park in Tenerife
Get you ticket online in advance.
Online Tickets are the same as the Entrance Gate. However the last you want to do is start you day in a queue. So Get Your Jungle Park Skip The Queue Tickets Here.
Take advantage of the free parking
The Jungle Park in Tenerife charges you €4 to park in their car park. But if you carry on driving just a few metres past the main entrance, you'll find an almost endless supply of free parking places.
When we left at 3pm, there was still ample parking available. So no matter what time you show up, you should be able to get parked and save a little bit of cash.
Hop on the free bus
If you've got no transportation or want to save on petrol, hop on the free Jungle Park bus. There are bus stops throughout Costa Adeje, Playa de Las Americas, and Los Cristianos and buses depart 4 times each day.
The park will also put on a special shuttle bus (also for free) for anyone in Golf del Sur, Ten Bel, Amarilla Golf, Los Gigantes, Playa Paraiso, Callao Salvaje or La Caleta if you book in advance.
Take your own food and drinks
To save even more money (are you sensing a theme?) you can take your own food and drink into the Jungle Park in Tenerife. When you find out the cost of two beers is €14, you'll be very happy you stopped at the supermarket before you left.
Use the jungle map
The free map is great for getting your bearings and on the back there's a list of all the animals in the park. As Jungle Park Tenerife is a bit of a maze, our advice is to tick the animal photos off as you see them, as you're almost guaranteed to miss some otherwise.
Important info about the Jungle Park in Tenerife
Official name: Jungle Park
Address: Urbanización Las Águilas del Teide s/n, 38640, Arona, Santa Cruz de Tenerife
Contact details: +34 922 72 90 10
Opening hours: Open 365 days a year 10am-5.30pm
Suggested time: 4-5 hours
Prices
Non-residents: €31-€33 for adults aged 11+, €24-€26 for children aged 5-10, €14 for children aged 3-4. (Prices change depending on when you visit)
Canarian residents: €19-€21 for adults aged 11+, €15-€12.50 for children aged 5-10, €8-€9 for children aged 3-4. (Prices change depending on when you visit)
Children under three years old can enter for free.
Have you been here? What did you make of it?