Atlas Essaouira Riad Resort Reviews

Clean and modern, nice bar which provides snacks and lunches

Nice hotel pity for the quality of the food. Spacious room and bathroom

good hotel

A good hotel, a beautiful reception from all the staff, elegant treatment and very delicious Moroccan food, especially the local breakfast, which was irresistible.

Good stay overall. Everything went well.

No matter how loudly or frequently the management describe this hotel as 5 star, it is only 3 star as other reviews have also made clear. A 5 star hotel needs 5 star service and 5 star fittings and finish. I attach some photos I took from our room and will let the reader of this review decide whether they are 5 star or not. When we originally arrived at the hotel, we received a pleasant welcome from the attendant in the car park who helped with our luggage. After that it was downhill. We were met with a very surly and unfriendly gentleman on Reception. We went up to our rooms and were told that our luggage would follow us shortly. After half an hour, our luggage had still not been brought up. I rang down to Reception saying we needed our luggage urgently. Again I was met with a very surly tone and told I had to wait. After another ten minutes, I went down to Reception and after I insisted we get our luggage, the receptionist in a most sulky and unprofessional manner flounced out from his desk and brought our luggage upstairs. I note that other reviews have also commented on the poor service from Reception, but nothing gets done to improve matters. I sent an email of complaint to senior management about this poor service but never received anything but a holding email. My complaint was in English because I am English. The reply was written in French. This is not 5 star service. The Hotel management could have come to find me either in our room or at the restaurant during breakfast. They made no effort to do so. This is not 5 star service. 5 star service starts with senior management and it is clear from the formulaic and repetitive replies to bad reviews that they never actually address the issues but instead are frequently couched in meaningless management verbiage eg we have taken your comments to heart and we are working to improve our service. These type of comments from senior management appear frequently, but nothing ever seems to change. I'm sure I will get the same meaningless reply. As one other reviewer made clear the only 5 star feature of this hotel is the view of the sea from the rooms. I would avoid this hotel.

First impressions are everything! We stayed at this hotel as part of Grand Morocco tour. Porter took our bags from the coach and after check in took them to our rooms. The porter stood expecting a tip , our Travel package stated all gratuities, baggage handling , tips have been paid throughout the holiday for hotels, restaurant tips for included meals. So as to not-wanting pay out more money we kindly said to the porter that gratuities are paid by our local travel Company.....porter muttered a profanity, turned and slammed the door of our room. I discussed in detail to the front desk even requesting to talk to the Manager....all I got-was a half hearted apology not very interested or apologetic! All Hotels included in the trip had a better handling and knowledge of travelling groups that gratuities are already covered and were paid in advance by us the traveller. So why would we pay out more? Dinner that night, we arrived first, 10 min later a few more people came in...waitress took our order long before others but found they were served before us, about 15 min had gone by and we were ready to walk out. Other tables were waited on repeatedly yet with us we only had the waitress come by once after the meal finely arrived. Not sure what the reason was maybe the fact we were the only Westerners in the room (North American), so its apparent that judging others in this country is prevalent ....we found this "judging" throughout Morocco, its a shame that because we didn't speak french and not European that we were not treated with the same respect. There wasn't a language barrier, the staff throughout property spoke english fluently. Just to make a point..,.we have always been friendly, showed appreciation and never took the attitude of any rudeness.

Nice hotel and beautiful grounds. The room was spacious as was the bathroom. Our only dissatisfied with our room was no air conditioning. Fortunately we could open the window and cool down the room. Screens would have been nice to keep out the bugs. Breakfast was good and the omelette station was great. The spa/gym was difficult to find and the gym was adequate but not serviced.

Lovely modern hotel right next to the beach. Fantastic facilities - had massages at the spa which were excellent. Good buffet breakfast. Not many people there in April so had the large pool and sun lounges mostly to ourselves. We had a sea view on the 1st floor but this had a lot of traffic noise so we changed rooms to a pool facing room.

We stayed here on a group tour. It’s a lovely hotel with friendly staff. Great location, just opposite the sea. The lobby area is beautifully decorated and furnished. The outdoor terrace and pool area is also beautiful furnished. They have a piano bar where there is live on most nights. The room was airy, bright and clean. Bedding and towels were as expected. They provide a towelling gown and slippers which was helpful. The breakfast was excellent with seating in the dining room and also on the terrace outside. There is also an omelette station outside. We would stay there again.

Great location. Nice hotel. Quiet. Nice bed. Fluffy towels. We were very comfortable. The breakfast was good. Not too much bread this time. Sweet town and so much to see there. Silver! Would recommend this hotel as we were comfortable and well treated.

NOT A 5* HOTEL.EXTREMELY DIRTY AND POOL UNUSABLE The hotel was once a high end hotel with a beautiful view over the beach. Over the decades it has been left to deteriorate and unmaintained and led by very poor management. The hotel is extremely dirty as is the pool which is unusable. I booked a Deluxe sea view room for 3 nights for my husband’s 60th birthday as a treat. Our room had a stunning view over the beach but this was the only positive point in the whole stay.The room was very dirty, the furniture chipped and damaged.In the bathroom the shower leaked,The tiles were either mouldy or the grout fallen out.Others areas had been badly patched up with filler including the sink.The pipe behind the toilet was hanging out.The surface of the bath was also peeling off. The safe was just placed in the wardrobe and not fixed in place.It could be removed by anyone and carried out. There were 2 small bottles of water provided on arrival but no glasses to drink from.They were never replaced.There were no coffee or tea making facilities available in the room which should be a basic service.When we asked at reception if we could have a kettle they said the hotel only had 10 of them and other people already were using them. At breakfast the drinks machines were either broken or giving you the wrong drinks.Upon complaint to the restaurant manager he swiftly made us coffee in the kitchen.He personally did the each day as soon as he saw us arriving for breakfast.Everyone else continued to struggle and moan. I also made him aware that the sanitiser machine outside the restaurant was empty as were the rest of the machines throughout the hotel.He instantly filled the one outside the restaurant but no others were ever refilled. Omelettes and pancakes made outside each morning were cooked on a dirty open plate which was never cleaned and left out in the open 24/7.My husband only realised after ordering an omelette which wasn’t even cooked through.The 2 caterers had 1 spatula between them and one was using there hands to pick up the food.His food was also served on a chipped plate.He left it obviously his breakfast. The toilets in the hotel lobby area and pool area were again extremely dirty, unmaintained and broken. I requested to speak to the hotel manager on 4 occasions during our stay but told he wasn’t available.I then asked for a form to post in there comments box.I was told that they didn’t have any.I was offered a pen, paper and envelope instead which I wrote my complaints on and posted in the allocated box by reception. This is no exaggeration.Please see our photos

Mixed reviews on this hotel, which certainly is not up to a 5-star standard: The good: This hotel was right across from the ocean and within 1 km away from the medina and port, so the location was fantastic! The hotel itself is expansive, and the lobby was tastefully decorated. The common areas were prettily decorated and kept clean. The grounds of the hotel are also expansive, and kept clean. There were a lot of couches in the courtyard outside that you can relax at. The room that we were given was clean and it was quiet. The bad: The pool area looks like it could be part of a horror movie, especially at night—it is gated off from the rest of the outdoor courtyard, and had a very creepy atmosphere so no one was there. Our rooms looked nice from afar, until we studied it more closely: The flushing button on our toilet was completely broken. There was a huge and ugly crack in our sink. There were cracks and mold starting in the bathtub. Instead of giving out individual containers of shampoo, soap, shower gel, etc, they had dispensers for them at the sink and in the shower that were fixed in place--which is completely fine and good. Unfortunately, the shower gel dispenser didn't work. I had to call to my husband to bring me a bar of soap that we took from another hotel in order to get myself clean. They only gave us 1 towel for the room, and we had to ask for more. The hotel safe was locked when we got to our room. The hotel was relatively prompt in getting a maintenance staff member to fix it. Although he tried, he couldn't open the safe. So he unscrewed the safe that was fixed to the cabinet and brought us a new one. Unfortunately, he didn't re-attach the safe to the cabinet, which meant that anyone could have picked up the safe and walked off with our valuables. That whole ordeal ended up being pretty pointless as a result. The food, although plentiful enough, ranged from average to disgusting. I remember tasting all of the vegetables that I had heaped on my plate at dinner time, and then exclaiming to my husband that they literally tasted like how camel dung smells. The meals were absolutely not what I would have expected from a 5 star hotel. All in all, it was a good enough hotel that if I were to come to Essaouira again, I would stay here, but I wouldn't want to eat here again.

The door to my room malfunctioned, this was not handled well by the staff. This is the main reason for my dissatisfaction, there was no understanding or real help from the staff, when I tried to talk to the receptionist about it, he was only smiling. For me, it is a problem when the door can´t be locked, or can´t be opened. This happened multiple times. Except for that, ok hotel, nice location with some rooms overlooking the sea.