returned from dar khayam on the 7th oct
excellent holiday,kids enjoyed every day we were there.
a few bad points and a lot of good points (but these are just my opinions).
our rooms was 1133 & 1134 above the kicthens on the 2nd floor, we were hardly there to gazy out of the balcony for any longer than 5mins, so view didnt really mattered. make sure if u are going to bring pens with you. cause the repection guy wont give you his to use, even if u beg him (i cant believe that the hotel can not afford to buy a box of pens for guest to fill out the checking in forms.if anyone is going out there soon pls take a box of pen for him) out of all the reception staff, the day shift guy was the most unhelpfull,unfriendly out of the bunch. the rest of the guys was great (cost nothing to smile).
staffs was great, from the cleaning guy/girl to restaurante staff to bar staff. all tried their best so you can enjoy your holiday.
we read alot of reports that the drinks were watered down, but we didnt find this to be the case. the food was great, with so much to chose from at each sittings, i could eat cakes till it come out of my ears tbh.
we took alot of medicines out with us, which cost a bomb in the uk. example imodium cost something like £4-5 for 6 tablets, in tunisia 20 tablets cost £1.50. the parmasist has everything you can think of all labled and the staff speaks english. dont listen to what the rep tells you, he knows very little for some one who has lived out there for over 4 years. if u ask him for direction to the nearest parmasist he will tell you to jump in a taxi and head towards yasmine 10mins ride away, forget that, walk out the front gate turn right, keep walking pass the water park, keep going straight pass the police box in the middle of a T junction, over a rail way track till u come to the end, turn right and the parmasist is 50ft on your right, total about 10mins walk.
if u have young girls in your group, do keep an eye on them! dont worry about the animation staff they are not the ones you have to worry about. keep an eye on the guy that rents out sun mats, and the younger serving staff. i had a run in with the sun mat guy cause to me a 26 year old man shoul not be chasing after a 13 year old girl. the lifeguard by the pool keeps an eye out over most of the kids, but he cant be everywhere all the time.he helped me get the message across to the sun mat guy. whiles we were there there was also a german couple who did not have kids themself, but the husband kept taking video footage of the other guests kids around the pool area and during the night at the entertainment room. a few guest told him to stop video'ing but he kept doing it to the point where one guy punched him. this guy even paid extra money to stay on even thought his 2 weeks holiday was up. he was moved to another hotel after complaints from guest.
Latif and Walid were great. never met 2 guys more dedicated,polite,friendly,always smiling(reception guy could learn from these 2) able to switch from 4-5 different languages in mid conversation lol. me and my son did the quad bike with walid 4 times in total. we just paid him £20 each instead of 50dinars. all 4 times we went different places and there was always someone behind to watch for straggles or if a quad stops working (little advise here, chose the green quads with the racks on front and back, the breaks works on these). 1 time we even took our youngest kids with us,5yr and 8yr, passangers are free by the way. the camel trip was great, you do get your moneys worth the trip lasted well over 3 hours, might be alittle long for some in the sadle.
we went on the pirateship on the 2nd week. this we would never ever recomend to anyone, we arrived on the doc as the 2nd coach of ppl. the ship looks great, we took some pictures and went aboard. went to the back of the boat next to the bbq (huge mistake, do not sit near this thing.unfortunately we didnt realise). another coach arrived and more ppl boarded, waited 5 mins and 2 more coach arrived,i said to my wife "i dont see another boat for these 2 coachfull of ppl to get on" she said our ship would sink if they jumped on ours... and yes you can guessed, they all got onto ours. we were packed in like sardines, you couldnt moved at all. all the seats was taken, and there were loads of ppl just standing up. over 5 hours this trip took, and even the kids was fed up after the first hour.
rest of our time was spend at the pool in the sister hotel next door. very quite and the kids enjoy the water slide there. not many ppl know about the waterslides here, check it out when you go, plus its alot more quit than the main pool. 1 of the day we were the only ppl there.
all in all it was a great holiday, first time flying for my wife and 2 youngest kids. we would not hesitate to go back to Dar Khayam, we have started saving up already.
thanks to all the info we had from this forum, it made us aware of what to expect when we got there.
if anyone need any info pls send me a pm
enjoy your holiday to those that are going