Welcome to the jungle: Mel Gibson's spectacular 400-acre Costa Rican tropical hideaway with three separate luxury villas is for sale for £23 million

Mel Gibson is selling his private jungle estate in Costa Rica, with an asking price of almost £23 million ($29.75 million).

The 61-year-old action hero found the property while location scouting for his film Apocalypto, an epic about the Mayan kingdom, which was released in 2006.

He tried to sell the Playa Barrigona property for $35 million in 2010 and then for $29.8 million in 2014, but has dropped the asking price again to shift it now.

In remote Nicoya Peninsula on Costa Rica’s northern Pacific coast, the tropical retreat includes 403 acres of privately owned jungle, as well as boasting two miles of coastline including a pristine white sand beach, Playa Barrigona, where sea turtles travel thousands of miles to lay their eggs.

There are three coral-stone and indigenous wood-built villas on the estate, the largest of which has seven bedrooms and eight bathrooms, a swimming pool, veranda tanning deck and barbecue area.

Two further villas have two bedrooms each as well as an additional poolside cottage near one, and a loft in the other, so there’s certainly enough space for Gibson's nine children to stay.

The actor, producer and director has an extensive property portfolio, with homes and estates all over the world.

He owns a private island in Fiji, which he bought in 2004 to protests from the original native inhabitants, who were displaced in the 1860s as well as properties in Australia.

Gibson is also selling his five-bedroom, medieval-themed Malibu mansion for $17.5 million, which he bought from David Duchovny and Tea Leoni in 2008 for $11.5 million.

For more information visit christiesrealestate.com