Royal Azur Hotel

I didn’t read the reviews here until after having booked the 2 weeks in Royal Azur, so I was worried our trip will turn out as bad as some people have written, but luckily it was not the case. We originally booked the Royal Azur because of a recommendation for the trio of the orangers hotels (Bel, Sol and Royal) and decided to go with the one with most stars. It takes about 1,5 hours to get to the hotel from the airport in Monastir and the trip is not particularly exciting as the landscape is pretty much the same everywhere with the ubiquitous olive trees. On arrival we were seated in the impressive lobby (spacious, air conditioned, marble everywhere) and served welcome drinks while filling out the paperwork. Upon arrival in our room, we were first hit with the smell similar to that of rotting cabbage, which I think came from the air conditioner. Throughout the holiday this smell came and went, although I must say that it got better with time, sometimes disappearing entirely and didn’t bother us too much. Other than this and a broken wheel on the thermostat I can’t really fault the room in any way. It was cleaned daily, the beds were comfortable to sleep in (with orthopaedic mattresses), there was a TV, a safe and it didn’t heat up very much during the day (we were freezing in our room with 35C outside!). As we arrived with sunrise, breakfast was the first thing that we had. Breakfast is pretty much standard with your usual cereals, jams, fresh bread, salad, sausages, eggs etc. and could be described as somewhat boring except for the delicious pancakes and omelettes that are prepared fresh in front of you by a team of chefs and served with ingredients of your choice. In fact, I still long for those pancakes! There is a selection of fresh fruit, which is ripe and very delicious (especially the peaches and apples) and if you are careful you can sneak some fruit out with you to the beach to eat for lunch. If you become hungry before dinner, there are a couple of places to eat near the beach, although the food is only average. I really can’t fault the selection of food for dinner. There is a good selection of salads, tasty tomatoes (not the watery crap sold in supermarkets) and a different selection of foods to choose from every day. In fact, during the 2 weeks I haven’t seen a lot of repetition. There is always fresh grilled meat and sausages, some local offering such as couscous with lamb and grilled fish. Particularly delicious is grilled fresh sea fish (up to a meter in length, which hangs on large hooks and the chef slices pieces off it), which is served about twice a week. Upon arrival you select a designated table where you eat every evening and you get more privacy than in other hotels, where tables form long lines and 8-12 people can be sitting at one large table. Drinks are to be purchased separately during dinner, which sucks, but prices are reasonable compared to European. Every evening there is a good selection of sweets and if you are a sweet-tooth like me, the apple-cinnamon mixture with hard crust on top is a must try! Overall we were quite happy with the food during dinner, and although none of it is gourmet stuff, we always managed to find something that was very enjoyable. Evening entertainment is practically the same every night, so if you’ve seen one you’ve seen all. There is more going on at the Bel Azur, where you can also relax with a water pipe and still be near the action. We really weren’t looking for an active night life, so it was okay with us. There were some stray cats around, but not nearly as many as I had feared. Staff were mostly very friendly, helpful and spoke some English although knowledge of French or Arabic is definitely an asset. Some SPA staff can be grumpy at times, but more passive-aggressive rather than rude. Internet access costs 5DT (about 3 euro) for an hour and is accessible through a miserable old abused Pentium with windows 98, with bucket loads of icq, msn messengers and God knows what other software installed on it by users. It’s very slow by itself and the internet connection is even slower. Serving up gmail’s login screen could easily take 2-3 minutes. Wifi access would be nice for this hotel. Outdoor pool is very pleasant and clean, although much smaller than seems from some of the promotional photos. If you want to get a seat near the pool you have to come early, as all places are taken quickly after breakfast. The beach is nice and sandy, although littered with cigarette butts and the like and can reach insane temperatures during the day. You get beach towels, but they are in short supply and good luck to you if you come at, say 3 in the afternoon. The sea is very transparent but not always clean – bottles and cans can be found on the bottom, plastic bags and paper labels floating on the surface on certain days near the shore. Overall it’s a nice 4-star hotel (on a European scale) which could benefit from some improvements in the infrastructure and organization, but it has a lot more positive points than negative.

After reading some of the reviews saying the hotel didn't meet standards i am very surprised. I thought it was excellent. Staff - All very polite and spoke excellent English (considering i cant even speak one other languge) as well as french and arabic. They were all very helpful and intersting to talk too. Even arriving at midnight there were porters to take our bags and free drinks were served in the lobby. Rooms - Although they had seen better days all the furniture was comfy we had adjoingin rooms and plenty of space to move around as well as a very spacious balcony. The bath room and shower were all clean and useable too - and lets face it dont spend much time in the room anyway!! Cleanliness - The rooms were spotless cleaned every day by the cleaners and fresh towels if needed. All other aspects of the hotel were clean too including the lobby fift areas and restauraunts. Food - Pleanty to satisfy any need breakfast was excellent with omlettes crepes made to order continenatal or cooked all was self service but the hundreds of waiting staff were happy to help. If hungry at lunch there was pleanty of choise in all three of the complex hotels. From omlettes to salads pizzas to brik with egg. Evening meal was also self service with drinks brought to the table. Pleanty of choice, my brother is vegetarian and he had no trouble cobbling together a filling meal every night - if you want english food dont come to Tunisia - but why would you want to go abroad to eat burger and chips!!!! Excursions - We booked an excursion with the hotel as opposed to with the travel company this made for a more interesting trip as there were people from other countries to and can practice your linguistic skills although all information was given in excellent english. Also this way there wasnt loads of hotel pick ups as is sometimes the case with tour company excursions!! Pool beach and surrounds - were excellent plenty of choice royal azur fairly peaceful no pool entertainment there was a slide but very unobtrusive if you want kids entertainment the other hotels in the complex had this - althought the kids around the royal azur pool seemed to enjoy them selves. The waiting staff were always polite and would get you any drinks from juice to alcoholic to a cup of coffee and the guys round the pool to were always there to help with sun beds etc. Beach was very peaceful to always got a sun bed round the pool or beach. Entertainment - fairly limited in the royal azur however there was live music round the pool every night and belly dancing - the sister hotels had more lively entertainemnt such as discos etc. There was the lobby bar which we frequented it was nice and calm to enjoy a peaceful drink waiters and bar staff very polite. Hammamet is worth a visit if you step in to the medina be aware you will be accosted but its harmless fun and they have caught on to phrases such as asda price and cheap as chips which is quite entertaining is all you have to do is politely decline them!! Yasmine Hammamet is a purpose built resort where most if not all shops are fixed price very expensive looking hotels but worth a vist and taxi only cost about £4 or can get a little road train from Hammamet. Most things are cheap in Tunisia for exapmle lunch for four of us with pizza or brik and drinks for example came to a tenner!! All in all a very good hotel nice staff, nice food, nice weather which led to a very relaxing and enjoyable holiday would definitly go again and would highly recommend.

As we checked out Tripadvisor before we booked we were well aware that this was not a 5 star. I write this review only to serve as a warning to others. The Royal Azur is part of a three hotel complex(Royal, Bel & Sol),they are all very diffrent with the Royal by far the best if you want a quiet holiday. Overall the hotel is good, the food is good, sometimes exellent but what it does not give you or will ever give you is (please take note!!!) if you are a burger and chips man, a everything with chips man!, or a fast food freak who cannot eat a more varied diet and is willing to try things DONT GO TO ANY OF THESE HOTELS!. Thay cater for a wide variety of european guests(uk people the minority), and cater to thier needs, we loved it but alot of the brits who were there complained bitterly about the food(some things never change!) Most of the rest of the hotel is three star plus(not 5 star), rooms are clean and tidy, beach is lovely, and pool area is clean and tidy but small for a big hotel. You are a good 15 mins from the nightlife of Yasmine Hammamet. Warning! the hotel entertainment at any one of the three is dire to say the least!!! As we left(sun 23rd)it was becoming unbearably hot(44 degrees) was the temp when we left!!!

We have just recently returned from the Royal Azur in Hammmamet and really enjoyed the holiday! The bedrooms are spacious and everything was clean and the maid service was excellent. I can understand why people would say its not a 5* because the room isnt 5* standards but that didnt bother us cause we had everything we needed in the room! I would say that the service was outstanding, the pool and the beach was beautiful and overall the holiday was one of the best I have been on, cant wait to go back there! Reading other peoples reviews Im just confused as I dont understand how anyone can say the hotel is horrible, are they talking bout the same one !!

We booked this knowing it would not be a 5* as specified in the brochure but we hoped for more than we got! The pool area and reception were fine but the rooms didnt look like they had been decorated in years. We did have a lovely view of the sea but had to pay a premium to get it.... We stayed for a week and that was long enough. Tried the buffet on arrival and it was very average, we then decided to eat out for the rest of the week! There are a couple of nice restuarants right outside the hotel which we went too. Hammamet itself is about a 20 minute walk. We only went once and that was enough! Too much hastle from the locals! The beach was pleasant but a little overcrowded and a lack of sunbeds... I would not go to Tunisia again and I would not reccommend this hotel.

We researched on different locations and hotels in Tunisia, our group was made of 6 adults and 3 children. We wanted a 5 star hotel, We reseached on the net and found Royal Azur which looked suitable for us. We phoned the tour operator and confirmed all the details; like is it a 5 star hotel, is it family orientated. Our tour operator was selling this holiday as a 5 star hotel which we saw on their web page. After a lot of complaints about the hotel services, our holiday rep informed us that Royal Azur was a 4 star hotel, which was totally misleading, the information is totally wrong, you have to pay for everything for e.g. babies milk, using the gym, paying for water in the evening dinner, the hotel claimes it has its own gym but you have to go to another hotel to use their facilities. The food was not good at all. The rooms were very dull and old fashion. It takes 15 minutes to get through to room services and once order is placed it takes atleast 30 minutes to get your order, all the hotel staff hardly speak English. I would not recommend this hotel to anyone. The pictures on the net look breathe taking but to be honest its not.

I made a total of 16 complaints about this terrible terrible hotel. These included: - Very rude staff- especially reception and spa. - No spa appts available till the day after our holiday ended. - NO vegetarian food options. - Numerous stray cats around the resort. - Terrible internet facilities. - Stale bread rolls everyday. - Disgusting smelling shower water. - Terrible evening entertainment- felt unsafe to leave the hotel to find alternatives. We tried to get an earlier flight home (in the middle of our 7 day holiday) but there was none available.

I have just returned from a week at this hotel and both me and partner loved it!! The welcome was lovely and we were served drinks after getting on the coach and were gob smacked by the gorgeous reception. Our room was clean and big with a sea view, the maid came in every day and swept the floor, made the beds, and basically couldn't do enough for us. The food every evening and morning was lovely and always plenty of choice. The staff were always very helpful and polite and went out of their way for us. The pool was great and we always managed to get loungers, the beach was beautiful and only took 30 seconds to walk to. My only disapointment is that we did'nt stay there longer!!! Overall - A*

It's evident from the other reviews that experiences at this hotel can be very different. Ours was positive - part of a Panomara package, all very efficient from that perspective although a tiring bus trip from the airport will get you to the hotel about 11:00pm. We didn't experience any local hassle (street vendors etc) at the airport. Hotel is spacious and pleasant, I'd agree with comments that it's showing its age a little but bearing up well. Our room was very clean, well-maintained and equipped with air conditioning, free safe, minibar (not too expensive by minibar standards) and balcony - this is worth trying to get as the temperatures can get oppressive and chillin' on the balcony is very relaxing. The TV had lots of channels but the few English-speaking ones were not working that often. Meals - at the buffet, lots of choice, well cooked, not gourmet but does the job. Cooked-to-order grill for omlettes, grilled fish etc. is very good. Layout of the buffet is a bit sub-optimal and once you've found your preference you may have to play hunt-the-plates/bowls, as well as spoons etc. The wine list is okay with some nice local wines, many available in half-bottles. The paid restaurants (e.g. the Niagra) are very pleasant, good value and nice places to sit. Outdoor pool is very good, well attended by staff looking after loungers/towels etc. We didn't really sample the beach or indoor pool enough to comment. Waiters are available for drinks, and the occasional unobtrusive hotel-sanctioned excursion vendor is polite and easy to decline. Reception - was pretty friendly to us. Money-exchange and bill-paying is all through one desk so can form a bit of a queue. Minor point - if you are going exploring on some of the organised trips (e.g. the MyTravel package ones), the trips collect from several hotels - be aware that this hotel is usually the start of the pickup route and last to drop-off (so if you're going to do LOTS of trips, you will spend more time on coaches here than at others). Overall - a nice holiday for a couple who wanted to chill around the hotel for a week. Did not experience any of the bad conditions that some other reviews indicate.

Hotel lobby was impressive, loads of marble, and all spotlessly clean. Room was more than adequate, with a great view from the balcony of the borganvillea growing up the sides of the hotel as well as the pool and the sea. Staff were all friendly, and all made the effort to say hello and ask how you were either in English or French. Pool area was well kept. Huge choice of food from both the breakfast and dinner menus although, as is usually the case with buffets, it could've been warmer. Our restaurant waiter was very pleasant and helpful. The beach area was fine, with plenty of loungers available. Again, the staff on the beach were very good. Jasmin Hamammet is worth a visit, it's quite newly built by the look of it, and has a very European feeling to it. You could be promending in Portugal. The hotels are all very nice, pop in and have a coffee or a beer, and see how other people are spending their holidays. There is a very pretty marina there with some rather nice boats (if you're into that sort of thing) There's also a Medina (market) but the locals are pretty pushy! Would recommend using the yellow taxis, but check on prices before you go anywhere, as meters seem to be non-existant! We took the Pirates and Gladiators excurson, but wouldn't recomment it unless you really like riding on a coach for hours on end. The outskirts of Sousse are covered with litter, which is a real shame, All in all, we had a great holiday, and woud go back again, although may change some of our itinery!