Palais Aziza & Spa

Loved it. Quiet, great suite, lovely grounds. WiFi wasn’t good and the food is pricey but overall we had a great time. Wasn’t full but that was a bonus. Small niggles only and you get those everywhere.

We wanted to escape the horrid UK Winter for a bit, but didn't want to be too long on a plane. Marrakech offered a solution. Ten days at this hotel with its spa seemed the best option and we made a very good choice. We had a very good stay. A few things stopped it being 'excellent' and I'll list those in due course, but first, the positives - of which there are many: - The hotel is quite small and set in very lush gardens. The pools are central to the communal areas. While we were there one was heated (apart from the final two days for some reason), the other - bigger pool - was not. A very charming and efficient chap is on hand to ensure that you have a lounger where you want it with plentiful supply of fresh towels - and drinks delivered to you as required (charged to your account) - The gardens are worthy of mention in themselves. Beautiful lush greenery with peacocks strutting round and of course, wild cats (it is Marrakech after all - the staff insist that you do not feed them as they claim to do so. They seemed to be well fed and in reasonable health). - We had one of the villas. A big double bed, two basin bathroom, big bath tub, walk in shower...all good. Very quiet. You might be woken by the peacocks running across your roof in the morning but isn't that rather special? And the peacocks and cats do come into your private little garden. Again, I appreciated that. - Tea and coffee facilities, mini bar and bottled water are provided in the villa. Lots of storage space, towels changed daily (if required). Housekeeping were excellent. - The on-site restaurant offers a broad menu of local and international dishes and will prepare meals off menu too. The quality was consistently excellent. Breakfast is buffet style with eggs cooked to order (and excellent omelettes). The orange juice is genuinely freshly squeezed. - We visited the spa for a massage. It's beautifully designed. I would suggest that you need to be very clear what it is you want. It is an advantage to speak French (or Arabic) as English was difficult for the lady I spoke to. A few niggles: - I suspect that at no time was the hotel more than a quarter full while we were there. perhaps this meant they operated on less than full staff. We observed, therefore, that s erratic. We arrived and reception desk was not staffed. We walked around for 5 minutes and eventually someone spotted us and came to greet us. He apologised, saying he was helping someone at the pool. - The decor of the villa is authentic, not designer. If you're looking for 'high end chic' you need to look elsewhere. A few maintenance issues showed some greater care is needed: a door to the wardrobe couldn't close properly because of a broken handle, a tile on the sunken bath was loose, the mattress felt a bit saggy. - Eating in the restaurant is a very good option (you're a good taxi ride from the city itself). However, service can be slow to the point of farce. It can easily take three hours to eat a three course meal! Fine if you're not in a rush but it's a commitment to give your entire evening just to sitting there waiting for food to arrive. Wine is readily available but eye wateringly expensive for modest labels (nothing below £40 a bottle). - There's a rather curt message in your room when you arrive saying that the first two coffee pods are free but anything after that has to be paid for. Two tea sachets. A bit on the mean side for a so-called five star establishment! - The pool that had been heated for the first days of our stay was suddenly stone cold for the final two. Not one person got in as a result. Deliberate policy? Maintenance issue? Who knows. Nobody communicated anything to us and nobody seemed to know. - There was maintenance work going on inside the main hotel which caused serious irritation while we were trying to relax by the pool. One day it was to change all the pictures in the dining area - drilling and banging for the best part of a whole day. The second day there was hammering and what sounded like bricks being knocked out which started shortly after we sat down at the pool. I complained and was assured it would stop. When it didn't, I spoke to the manager. It did stop but it started again on our final day. That's not good enough. No apology was received, nor any explanation. That's not good enough. - The final insult was on the last night one of the waiters asked if we had enjoyed our stay and then asked if we wanted to make an additional payment for service. Answer? Not really - especially when we have been told that there is a service charge on all transactions and anyway, the food taking three hours when the restaurant never had more than a few tables occupied seemed a bit of a cheek! - wifi was fine in the villa but worse than useless in the communal areas and by the pool. In conclusion, this is probably a 4* rather than a 5* hotel. I make allowances for it being Morocco rather than Europe, but even so - it needs to up its game if it is truly to claim to be top end.

What a lovely place if you are looking for some nice quite days. The Hotel has a fantastic garden and lots of peacocks walking around. The room we had was very well equipped and had a fireplace. The decoration is all very marrokan, but I guess that's what you want when yo go traveling there. A place I would love to come back to one day.