Well - What can i say. I am gonna be completely honest and obvously this is only my opinion. There are some good things to say but there are some bad things to say. Firstly i wouldnt choose to go back to this hotel - You will understand why after reading this. I would however go back to this area as i did enjoy the holiday.

We arrived after a 2 and a half hour flighht. Got driven in a bus to the terminal. It was 1am i might add so we were very tired. Got to the terminal filled out an imigration card in the queue for passport check and got thru customs to baggage in about 30minutes. Very quick i thought. baggage took about 30 minutes then we started walking to the coach. Beware of the little men who grab your bags to take them back to the coach as they EXPECT money. My boyfriend is american and we gave him a $1 bill. We had no Tunisian or english money on us. He complained and gave us a rude remark but we just let it go over our heads - ungratefuly little %&(^! Anyway, Rep wasnt very informative on the way but they never are so not really that bothered. Took 10 mins to get to sahara beach - first hotel the coach stops at!

Got there and they took our bags off the coach - MAKE sure your get your bags off and taken by a hotel porter to the door!

go into the hotel and they give you a form to fil out for the all incl cards. takes 5 minutes. Got allocated a room and the guy on reception said we couldnt get our cards til the morning. We said we'd prefer them now so he did it for us...everyone else waited til the morning as it was already 2.30am!

Room quite small but perfect for sleeping in. Lovely little balcony big enough to sit out and have a few drinks in the evening. Which we did a couple of times. ?Sea view? If you stretched your neck around the trees and the other side of the hotel you could see the sea.

The rest ...

ALL INCLUSIVE CARDS
Pointless - I think the only reason they use them is for stock control...cant really see why in a hotel with over 2000 guests!
We took a Litre thermos flask each to keep our drinks cold and on the first day tipped they barman at the pool side bar 5 TND (£2.50) and he gave us 2 bottles of cold coke. We also brought our own whiskey as the alcohol there was DISGUSTING! I reccommend you bring your own if you dont drink wine - even that is very acidic! We made our drinks in the flasks and took em down the beach - had a cold drink all day then!

RESTAURANT!
Hated it - Sorry!
Food was not nice. Catered for the germans when it should really have been tunisian food - to my opinion anyway! In tunisia and i think i saw couscous once! Lunch meals were better than evening meals but dont even bother with breakfast! Waste of time unless you like oily sausages mushy tomatoes and rock hard bread! At an all inclusive hotel this size i would have expected fruit for breakfast and maybe croissannts that werent stale! go before 9am if you want to get something edible as all the left overs are even worse!

Waiters in the restauarnt are good. Fredji was lovely and efficient but this didnt make up for the disorganisation of the place. You get allocated a table and 3 times it was dirty when we got there or occupied by other guests - why bother allocating a table if its not going to be for you! I probably sound a little snobby, i just dont expect this kind of service when on holiday.

Dress code in the restaurant really wasnt apparent. Shorts are fine in the evening. As long as your not wet during the day from teh pool or sea they dont really care. I went in in a bikini one lunch time and no-one batted an eyelid!

If you miss breakfast you cant eat until 11ish uless you pay for it in the pizzeria or in the shop. The beach snack bars are ok but again they arent really anythingh special. We lived on Pizza most of the time and even that wasnt very nice. the pizzeria was better but you had to pay for it (IN AN ALL INCLUSIVE HOTEL)

ANIMACION
The team were friendly but after working in an animacion team in mexico myself i spotted a lot of huge differences between the standard of staff there. For a start none of them could really dance and this really affected the shows in the evening - the grease show reminded me of watching a 10 year old child in a school play - Poor and un rehearsed! The Celtic show was better but still not at the standard of other animation teams.
One of the guys took a liking to me and was very unprofessional. I was on holiday with my boyfriend who got very irritated by the end of the holiday. So girls beware of Samir. Nice enough guy but obviously thinks he's gods gift to women (which he isnt - looks a bit like a weasel) Very sneaky and would try and sit with me everytime by BF went to get us a drink in the evenings or by the beach etc.
Bingo was good, if you hook up one of the animacion guys with a strong drink he'll sort you out with more than one game card - nice one Gigi!

ASFAR BAR - (24HOUR BAR)
They dont mention in the holiday brochure that all inclusive stops at midnight and you have to pay for even water!
Staff very rude except one guy who brought drinks up to out room coz i couldnt carry them all!

NIGHT CLUB
I really enjoyed the night club! It got fairly busy but if you go in at 11pm when it opens you get a nice table and sofa by the dance floor and its reallynice place to meet people and have a dance. We got a bit fed up of all the Techno music they played so took in our own CD most nights and they played it. They even played Salsa music so we could dance to that!
It is for over 16's but i am sure we saw a little boy of about 13 in there one night! A lot of the locals go there as it is one of the only night clubs around that area. it attracts people from other hotels too which was good coz we met a lovely couple of girls from liverpool there too!
Club closes at about 3am but will keep going til abou 3.15 if you request a "last song" !!!!

POOL AREAS
We didnt really sit by the pool much as i found i was allergic to the water - sounds silly but i think it must have been the type of chlorine used or something like that. The only observation we made was that it was very crowded and you were pretty much herded in to pack as many people in the space as possible.

BEACH
Lovely - Beautiful sandy beach clear blue and green water and plenty of sun beds. We came down from our room no earlier than 10am every morning and we managed to find a space every day. Didnt alwasy get a bed but alwasy had one of there plastic covered foam matresses which were fine to put your towel on and sunbathe.
Also - a lot of people were talking about being topless on the beach and thong bikinis! Perfectly fine no one bats an eyelid! All the women are topless and we even saw a guys in thong (we called him thong man) -

MATRESSES AND SUNBEDS
My advice is if you can get up early do it but if not its really not a problem. You shouldnt have to tip the matress guys as they are paid a wage fromt he hotel but they do hang around and ask if you have anything for them. Just tell you dont have any money with you - It is an all inclusive hotel after all!

WATERSPORTS
FANTASTIC!!!!!!!! We went paragliding, jet skiing, Big Mable which is a huge sofa atached to the back of a boat that wisks you across the water! Very fun but if you sit on the outside right you rpobably will fall off - My boyfriend did and we had to go back and get him!
All very good prices. 15 TND for paragliding per person, double it if you go together. Jet skiing was 15TND for 10 minutes which isnt too bad! and MABLE was 5 TND each!

OUTSIDE THE HOTEL
I would recommend a restaurant in Sousse to any one that loves Seafood. The lobster was fantastic! it was 1800 Kg but well worth the 180TND we paid for it! The meal was fairly pricey but lobster alwasy is. Probably wouldnt have been so much if you didnt have lobster. they bring you out complimentary starters as well as your oreded starters which are delicious. The Tuna doughnut things are to die for! As well a the mini Brik with potato.
The service is out of this world and well worth a good tip! to finish off the meal they bring you a complimentary liqueor and a sweet tunisian tea!
Very very good.

We got the guy to flag down a horse and carriage for our return journey as it was a special occasion and that was wonderful. he took us all around sousse and back to a taxi that took us back to Skanes.

ACQUA PALACE - Port El Kantaoui
This water park was very nice for a morning we spent about 4 hours there. Wasnt really much for us to to do. the slides were good bu for a 19 and 24 year old couple not really that thirlling. More of a kids thing. the wave pool only worked every 3 hours and we missed it while we were eating in the restaurant! Very ncice little place tho and only 15TND to get in so well worth it. Taxis outside will take you back to skanes.

Overall we had a fantastic holiday coz we made it special but i really wouldnt go back to the Sahara Beach. For a 3* all inclusive i would probably rate it 4/10! All inclusive clearly isnt understood at this hotel, the concept seems to phase them. I think the Half board option would maybe be more value for money as we took our own alcohol and ate out quite a lot anyway! For me the hotel catered for families more than couples and without sounding rude - i cant stand little kids screaming in the restaurant when your trying to have a nice quiet meal. Nor can i stand little brats throwing tantrums right in the way of where your walking! Too many kids im afraid!

The area was very convenient and well located to the airport, shops and local sights . We would have liked to have found a place to go fishing on a boat but didnt seem to find anywhere that would allow just us to go out.

The reps from thompson were very helpful and informative. The guy from first choice also very good.

Mourhad on reception was very helpful when we waned to got to the leather store. 4 tailor made leather jackets for 1180 TND (about £500) was a really goood bargain and this guy organised a free bus ride over there (5 minute drive) The hotel proably got comission for it but we got 2 lovely jackets each so it was well worth it!

All in all - Family resort that should not be advertised as an All inclusive. Had a great time everything was clean and there were no rats like some of the rviews a couple of kittens running around though, No mosquitos, didnt get bitten once!

Well - What can i say. I am gonna be completely honest and obvously this is only my opinion. There are some good things to say but there are some bad things to say. Firstly i wouldnt choose to go back to this hotel - You will understand why after reading this. I would however go back to this area as i did enjoy the holiday.

We arrived after a 2 and a half hour flighht. Got driven in a bus to the terminal. It was 1am i might add so we were very tired. Got to the terminal filled out an imigration card in the queue for passport check and got thru customs to baggage in about 30minutes. Very quick i thought. baggage took about 30 minutes then we started walking to the coach. Beware of the little men who grab your bags to take them back to the coach as they EXPECT money. My boyfriend is american and we gave him a $1 bill. We had no Tunisian or english money on us. He complained and gave us a rude remark but we just let it go over our heads - ungratefuly little %&(^! Anyway, Rep wasnt very informative on the way but they never are so not really that bothered. Took 10 mins to get to sahara beach - first hotel the coach stops at!

Got there and they took our bags off the coach - MAKE sure your get your bags off and taken by a hotel porter to the door!

go into the hotel and they give you a form to fil out for the all incl cards. takes 5 minutes. Got allocated a room and the guy on reception said we couldnt get our cards til the morning. We said we'd prefer them now so he did it for us...everyone else waited til the morning as it was already 2.30am!

Room quite small but perfect for sleeping in. Lovely little balcony big enough to sit out and have a few drinks in the evening. Which we did a couple of times. ?Sea view? If you stretched your neck around the trees and the other side of the hotel you could see the sea.

The rest ...

ALL INCLUSIVE CARDS
Pointless - I think the only reason they use them is for stock control...cant really see why in a hotel with over 2000 guests!
We took a Litre thermos flask each to keep our drinks cold and on the first day tipped they barman at the pool side bar 5 TND (£2.50) and he gave us 2 bottles of cold coke. We also brought our own whiskey as the alcohol there was DISGUSTING! I reccommend you bring your own if you dont drink wine - even that is very acidic! We made our drinks in the flasks and took em down the beach - had a cold drink all day then!

RESTAURANT!
Hated it - Sorry!
Food was not nice. Catered for the germans when it should really have been tunisian food - to my opinion anyway! In tunisia and i think i saw couscous once! Lunch meals were better than evening meals but dont even bother with breakfast! Waste of time unless you like oily sausages mushy tomatoes and rock hard bread! At an all inclusive hotel this size i would have expected fruit for breakfast and maybe croissannts that werent stale! go before 9am if you want to get something edible as all the left overs are even worse!

Waiters in the restauarnt are good. Fredji was lovely and efficient but this didnt make up for the disorganisation of the place. You get allocated a table and 3 times it was dirty when we got there or occupied by other guests - why bother allocating a table if its not going to be for you! I probably sound a little snobby, i just dont expect this kind of service when on holiday.

Dress code in the restaurant really wasnt apparent. Shorts are fine in the evening. As long as your not wet during the day from teh pool or sea they dont really care. I went in in a bikini one lunch time and no-one batted an eyelid!

If you miss breakfast you cant eat until 11ish uless you pay for it in the pizzeria or in the shop. The beach snack bars are ok but again they arent really anythingh special. We lived on Pizza most of the time and even that wasnt very nice. the pizzeria was better but you had to pay for it (IN AN ALL INCLUSIVE HOTEL)

ANIMACION
The team were friendly but after working in an animacion team in mexico myself i spotted a lot of huge differences between the standard of staff there. For a start none of them could really dance and this really affected the shows in the evening - the grease show reminded me of watching a 10 year old child in a school play - Poor and un rehearsed! The Celtic show was better but still not at the standard of other animation teams.
One of the guys took a liking to me and was very unprofessional. I was on holiday with my boyfriend who got very irritated by the end of the holiday. So girls beware of Samir. Nice enough guy but obviously thinks he's gods gift to women (which he isnt - looks a bit like a weasel) Very sneaky and would try and sit with me everytime by BF went to get us a drink in the evenings or by the beach etc.
Bingo was good, if you hook up one of the animacion guys with a strong drink he'll sort you out with more than one game card - nice one Gigi!

ASFAR BAR - (24HOUR BAR)
They dont mention in the holiday brochure that all inclusive stops at midnight and you have to pay for even water!
Staff very rude except one guy who brought drinks up to out room coz i couldnt carry them all!

NIGHT CLUB
I really enjoyed the night club! It got fairly busy but if you go in at 11pm when it opens you get a nice table and sofa by the dance floor and its reallynice place to meet people and have a dance. We got a bit fed up of all the Techno music they played so took in our own CD most nights and they played it. They even played Salsa music so we could dance to that!
It is for over 16's but i am sure we saw a little boy of about 13 in there one night! A lot of the locals go there as it is one of the only night clubs around that area. it attracts people from other hotels too which was good coz we met a lovely couple of girls from liverpool there too!
Club closes at about 3am but will keep going til abou 3.15 if you request a "last song" !!!!

POOL AREAS
We didnt really sit by the pool much as i found i was allergic to the water - sounds silly but i think it must have been the type of chlorine used or something like that. The only observation we made was that it was very crowded and you were pretty much herded in to pack as many people in the space as possible.

BEACH
Lovely - Beautiful sandy beach clear blue and green water and plenty of sun beds. We came down from our room no earlier than 10am every morning and we managed to find a space every day. Didnt alwasy get a bed but alwasy had one of there plastic covered foam matresses which were fine to put your towel on and sunbathe.
Also - a lot of people were talking about being topless on the beach and thong bikinis! Perfectly fine no one bats an eyelid! All the women are topless and we even saw a guys in thong (we called him thong man) -

MATRESSES AND SUNBEDS
My advice is if you can get up early do it but if not its really not a problem. You shouldnt have to tip the matress guys as they are paid a wage fromt he hotel but they do hang around and ask if you have anything for them. Just tell you dont have any money with you - It is an all inclusive hotel after all!

WATERSPORTS
FANTASTIC!!!!!!!! We went paragliding, jet skiing, Big Mable which is a huge sofa atached to the back of a boat that wisks you across the water! Very fun but if you sit on the outside right you rpobably will fall off - My boyfriend did and we had to go back and get him!
All very good prices. 15 TND for paragliding per person, double it if you go together. Jet skiing was 15TND for 10 minutes which isnt too bad! and MABLE was 5 TND each!

OUTSIDE THE HOTEL
I would recommend a restaurant in Sousse to any one that loves Seafood. The lobster was fantastic! it was 1800 Kg but well worth the 180TND we paid for it! The meal was fairly pricey but lobster alwasy is. Probably wouldnt have been so much if you didnt have lobster. they bring you out complimentary starters as well as your oreded starters which are delicious. The Tuna doughnut things are to die for! As well a the mini Brik with potato.
The service is out of this world and well worth a good tip! to finish off the meal they bring you a complimentary liqueor and a sweet tunisian tea!
Very very good.

We got the guy to flag down a horse and carriage for our return journey as it was a special occasion and that was wonderful. he took us all around sousse and back to a taxi that took us back to Skanes.

ACQUA PALACE - Port El Kantaoui
This water park was very nice for a morning we spent about 4 hours there. Wasnt really much for us to to do. the slides were good bu for a 19 and 24 year old couple not really that thirlling. More of a kids thing. the wave pool only worked every 3 hours and we missed it while we were eating in the restaurant! Very ncice little place tho and only 15TND to get in so well worth it. Taxis outside will take you back to skanes.

Overall we had a fantastic holiday coz we made it special but i really wouldnt go back to the Sahara Beach. For a 3* all inclusive i would probably rate it 4/10! All inclusive clearly isnt understood at this hotel, the concept seems to phase them. I think the Half board option would maybe be more value for money as we took our own alcohol and ate out quite a lot anyway! For me the hotel catered for families more than couples and without sounding rude - i cant stand little kids screaming in the restaurant when your trying to have a nice quiet meal. Nor can i stand little brats throwing tantrums right in the way of where your walking! Too many kids im afraid!

The area was very convenient and well located to the airport, shops and local sights . We would have liked to have found a place to go fishing on a boat but didnt seem to find anywhere that would allow just us to go out.

The reps from thompson were very helpful and informative. The guy from first choice also very good.

Mourhad on reception was very helpful when we waned to got to the leather store. 4 tailor made leather jackets for 1180 TND (about £500) was a really goood bargain and this guy organised a free bus ride over there (5 minute drive) The hotel proably got comission for it but we got 2 lovely jackets each so it was well worth it!

All in all - Family resort that should not be advertised as an All inclusive. Had a great time everything was clean and there were no rats like some of the rviews a couple of kittens running around though, No mosquitos, didnt get bitten once!

If you didn`t like the Sahara Beach, but still really like the Skanes area, we liked the Skanes El Hana, it wasn`t all inclusive, we were on half-board, but we thought the food was really good, we never went hungry, and I`m pretty finicky about my food, so couldn`t have been that bad. When we went into Port El Kantoui we took a taxi for about £5, then coming back we took the Noddy train to Sousse, then taxied back to the hotel from there for about £4.

Haven't seen it mentioned anywere (but haven't looked that hard, to be honest...) but was wondering if the hotel is still split (roughly) into a British half and a German half ?

That was the case when we stayed there - there was a separate reception, bar, etc for the German guests which had TV in German showing, while the Asfar (?) end showed programs in English. Thought it was a bit weird, and we found that sitting in the German "end" of an evening could be much more pleasant than the British side -- a few too many of the "Brits on tour" brigade for my liking. Never been a big fan of Union Jack hats/shorts/skirts, especially in the evening. Fair enough by the pool

Hi All, We went to this hotel 2 years ago and throught it to be great the only thing that was not to good was the food, it did catrer for the germans, but everyhting else was great, cleaning, staff, room, we had a interconecting room as if you are a family of 4 this is what they give you, we did not have to pay any extra for this, but i know you have to now, i think the only tour operator who you get them free is Panarama, entertainment was great, pools good, thier is a fax machine you can use and their are 4 telephones and the bars staff inside the hotel cannot do enough for you, i would rate the hotel 4 star, but hte food2-3 star, thier is a bech bar whee you can get icecream sanwiches and drinks from.

hya.
We're back. all nicely tannned . Will post a review about the hotel later today.
The Sahara Beach you're either going to love it or hate it.
We enjoyed it and had what i was looking for . a week of doing absolutely nothing .
Any questions just ask away.

WELCOME HOME WELSHONEY!

Glad you enjoyed it, its now only 6 days til I go!! I must say, i'm also looking to relax for a fortnight.

There are many questions I would like to ask, but dont want to bombard you. Besides, you may have put a lot of the answers into your review (not sure if you have put one on yet, but will check soon).

Clothing at mealtimes for men? Any net access locally? Watersports, did you get upto any? If so, how much were they, and were there and pedaloes?

Nice to have you back posting anyway Welshoney.

Crazygoog,
We got back a week ago...

Clothing at meal times - You can wear shorts or long trousers whichever you want! It really isnt anything special in the restaurant and the waiters are far too busy arguing with the head waiter to even notice if you dont wear long trousers. I went in in a bikini one lunchtime so i really wouldnt worry about that!

Paragliding is 15 TND per person for one round. Jet skiing is i think 15 TND for 10 minutes and BIG MABLE which is an inflatable sofa pulled by a speed boat (GREAT FUN) is 5 TND per person. All available daily on the beach. Sunday is not as a vailable as the other days but you can still find em! They will try to get you to sell your swimming shorts if you have a ny funky ones. My boyfriend got offered 25TND for a flourescent pair of yello board shorts - i urged him to sell them but he couldnt part with them!

Internet access - You'll be lucky! Maybe if you go into P el K but you will be very very lucky to find it anyweher that its in english!

Anyother questions let me know i am online all day - give welshoney a chance to sleep off all that sun!

bombard me with any questions you like, I'm well rested, and hope I can help with anything to make your holiday experience a great one.

Hey welshoney - Glad you had a good time - i probably sound really negative dont i - We did have a great time just really put off by the food and quality of the service in the restaurant. everything else except the all inclusive "joke" was great!

how about you...? Did you go to the water park at all?

Going to Tunisia for the first time this year it's great to get all this fab advice, will be staying in the sahara can anyone give me advice on car hire.

Welcome home Welshoney
Looking forward to reading your review, am glad to hear you did enjoy your holiday

It seems that tipping is very important and as you are not allowed to bring in dinar can you change traveelers cheques at the airport or is it better to wait until you get to the hotel.

No-one has mentioned anything about pedaloes yet. So they dont seem to have any as nobody has mentioned them?

The nightclub; any info on this place seems to be scarce at the moment, so further information would be appreciated. Will they play guests own cd's? Saw a review saying that it was mainly techno rubbish that was played inside, so they asked if they could put their own cd on and they agreed. Also prices inside the bar, and drink quality.

Also, the pizzas. Are they free to AI guests? Heard some say that you have to pay for them. Are the desserts also still as good as previously mentioned?

I'm getting giddy now.....

Hiya - Yeah they will play CD's if you take em in and tell them the specific tracks! They wont play a whole CD though! Dont know about drinks prices in the club coz BF bought em all...im spoilt ha ha!

Night club we really enjoyed it - bigger than you would think after looking at it from the outside and a nice way to finish the evening if you enjoy dancing and drinking - A lot of 15/16 year olds though!

Pedaloes - never saw any, probably best to go into Port el Kantaoui...just a guess though.

Desserts - If you like cream you'll be fine but personally i didnt enjoy any of the food at all - the only dessert i did like was the choclate cheesecake but i was so put off the food by the time it came out i didnt eat half of it!

Pizzas yes they are free to all incl guests but the AI ones on the beach bar are DISGUSTING. not much tomatoe sauce and a few bits of cheese.
The ones in the pizzeria are better - but of course you have to pay for anything thats fairly decent in this hotel - AI is a joke to be honest it should be a half board hotel in my opinion.

jlcmexico. I adore seafood can you give me the name of the restaurant you went to.

DEFINITLY if you go into Sousse its just before a restauarnt called bonaprtes on the same side of the road - the reason i say this is that all the taxi drivers know bonapartes but the nice restaurant is called Le Baron. The service is PERFECT and the food is even better! Ask for the guy with long hair think he's the manager he's the only one that speaks english he will expain the whole menu to you!

Called Le Baron - If its a romantic night ask the manager to track down the horse and carriage that drives past it was magical! Lobster is wonderful there but fairly pricey - 1800g cof amazing lobster was £150! there's another place on the beach from Sahara beach hotel - turn right when you get onto the beach from the hotel - walk down a little way an dyou'll get to a little place on the beach - Very good prawns!

Thanks for the info jlcmexico. Shame about the pedaloes, but the chocolate cheesecake cant wait!

You mention about a place to eat further down the beach.....is there more places to eat out locally, or down the beach? Just in case the food is as bad as you say.

If your willing to pay for food outside of the hotel even though your on an all inclusive basis you can eat pretty much whatever you want! There are lots of italian restaurants in sousse and lots of seafood too. I would AGAIN recommend the Le Baron restaurant next to Bonapartes. Its fairly pricey but food and service is PERFECT!

The one further down the beach is about £15 a head for 2 courses and a drink. So much cheaper than the one in sousse.