Loro Parque

Loro Parque was born from an impossible dream. On 17 December 1972, German entrepreneur Wolfgang Kiessling opened a small parrot park in Puerto de la Cruz. It was pouring with rain, the heating exploded overnight, the flyers never arrived, and of 5,000 balloons they managed to inflate 50. Banks refused credit, saying: 'Plenty of fools want to make money, but with parrots? We have never seen that one.' Kiessling did not give up.

Today, over 50 years later, Loro Parque houses more than 400 species across 135,000 m², has welcomed over 60 million visitors and has been named Best Zoo in the World by TripAdvisor. In 2025 the park welcomed a record of nearly 3.5 million guests. It has the world's largest parrot collection (4,000 birds of 350 species), the largest indoor penguin enclosure with real snow, one of only two orca facilities in Europe, and Europe's first free-flight parrot show (since 1984). In September 2024 it received the first humane certification in Europe for animal care (American Humane), based on independent scientific standards.

But Loro Parque is far more than a zoo. Its Foundation has invested over $29 million in 300 conservation projects, saving 12 parrot species from extinction. In February 2025 the Foundation sent nine Lear's macaws to Brazil for reintroduction: the largest such transfer in the programme's history. On 31 March 2025 the female orca Morgan gave birth to a male calf named Teno, the first orca born in Europe, who is growing healthily under his mother's care.

Wolfgang Kiessling, living with his wife Brigitte in the heart of the park, still heads the company as president. His son Christoph Kiessling serves as vice-president and runs the Foundation. The park is open 365 days a year: it has never closed voluntarily in its history (the only exception was COVID-19 in March 2020).