What's new for Gardaland's 50th season

Many novelties for the first 50 years of Gardaland, the theme park in the province of Verona. The most important one is "Animal Treasure Island", new big attraction with an underground water dark ride covering an area of over 6 thousand square metres. A world premiere fruit of an investment of around 10 million born from the creativity of Merlin Magic Making, division of Merlin Entertainments, which owns Gardaland. The attraction brings to life an adventure on a mysterious island along a route with over 20 scenes. "It is the longest aquatic dark ride in Europe with a duration of 9 minutes and 30 seconds - explains Stefano Cigarini, Ceo & Vice President Gardaland Resort - enveloped by a very high fidelity sound system with a 25 track soundtrack, geolocalised and enveloping sounds in a themed setting with, among other things, big screens with video mapping for a wow effect". The capacity is 1,200 people per hour, about 12,000 throughout the day.

Within the Merlin Group's 130 attractions, museums, Sea Life Aquarium and theme parks, "Gardaland contributes 10% of revenues," emphasises the CEO. "It is the number one attraction in Italy and beats the Coliseum in terms of takings, while in terms of number of visitors it ranks fourth after the Coliseum, the Vatican Museums and the excavations of Pompeii. During its 50 years of activity "Gardaland has been visited by more than 100 million visitors overall," adds Cigarini. A "factory" of fun and amusement that, when fully operational, employs over 1,300 people, more than 700 of whom are seasonal, which in summer, with the evening opening, becomes 1,100, plus 230 permanent employees.

Among the park's new additions for the season is 'Dragon empire', an entirely redesigned area where the Orient takes shape amidst lights, colours and adrenaline. Here, the indoor Rocket Factory experience challenges you to become an apprentice to the masters of fireworks, while Dragon Rush provides all-round thrills with unpredictable turns.

Gardaland Theatre will host the debut of "A.I. The future is here", a show that blends technology and creativity to create an extraordinary experience. Astonishing special effects and incredible performances will captivate the public, overcoming all language barriers to make them think about the relationship between man and artificial intelligence. The park will also "celebrate" mascot Prezzemolo with "Prezzemolo and the mystery of hidden worlds". The film produced by Gardaland is screened in Cinema 4D and offers the public a new cinematic experience full of emotions and twists. Science and magic intertwine to create an adventure through distant worlds, the same ones that have inspired and marked the park since 1975. Guests will experience together with Prezzemolo a reverse journey to the origins of the park in a truly unique way.

New production at the Theatre of Fantasy with "Bim Bum Bam live", the TV programme broadcast in the 80s and 90s by Italia Uno, whose theme songs were actually filmed at Gardaland, which launched Paolo Bonolis. Protagonist of the show will be Uan - the irresistible pink puppet who has entertained entire generations with his overwhelming charm. Uan will return to Gardaland to celebrate the Park's birthday and to reunite with his great friend Prezzemolo in an event designed to excite those who have grown up with the programme and to involve the younger ones of today.