Hôtel Club Al Moggar — Hotel in Agadir

After being booked for an all-inclusive formula for five days, meaning that I was fully taken in charge, lodging, food, drinks and entertainment, what have I discovered in Almoggar Garden Beach hotel?

The rooms are in very poor conditions, and have nothing to do with the pictures advertised on the hotel's website. The beds are ragged and neglected. Cleanness is amateurish because the homemakers there use bare water without any perfume or detergents to clean. You do not smell anything in the room after cleaning, sometimes it is kept wet. Towels are damaged by long use, and never given on time. The swimming pool is well designed but very dirty. The food is served in a buffet that may attract your eyes with its colours and the soft movement of the servers as if everything is in order. You see the salads, the meat, the fish, the dessert, but no guest seem to stop to inquire whether the food is clean and safe to eat. Appearances are commonly deceptive. There is no waiting staff to strictly supervise the self service buffet. They trust customers' moral behaviour though some Moroccan guests are observed to use their hands to touch food pieces while selecting what to put on their plates. They reproduce the schema of bread buying at a shop counter. Also, as it is mentioned before, the buffet at lunch includes left-overs of the previous night buffet. So, clients are paying all-inclusive formula only to eat recycled food from the previous nights. For instance, when they fry fish in front of clients during the night, giving them the impression that they cook fresh food, they serve the rest in a container the following day at lunch.

there is a big question mark here on whether the hotel restaurant staff does serve immediately cooked fresh meals for hundreds of clients everyday --breakfast, lunch and dinner --, or do they simply cook meals in advance and store them cooked in chamber freezers to be warmed up and served on demand? Of course the second solution is the most practical for big hotels as some ex-workers assert, and Almogggar appears to make no exception. It is very strange, when families cook fresh dishes at home, and queerly pay a fortune to eat recycled food residues and frozen cooked meat and chicken unaware. Is this an all-inclusive package or a "left-overs" package?

All-inclusive formula provides drinks for clients for free. For Moroccans and foreigners who drink alcohol, they can enjoy the booze. What are these selected beverages that Almoggar provides for its clients? Non-alcoholic beverages are all served in glasses; no bottles are served to clients. So, if you ask for coke, it is one glass after one glass, it is one big bottle opened and closed ten times or more. No one knows how long it may be stored till to be consumed. For alcoholic beverages, they serve the cheapest quality of wine and beer, "mughrabi" and "stork," named respectively, seizing foreigners' ignorance of Moroccan high quality brands, needless to say here that they are fooling the locals as well.

Entertainment is a fiasco in Almoggar; instead of advertising local pop culture in musical performances and theatre, a band of some young novices is hired to act western stock-roles and perform apish stereotypical imitations.

You can get easily intoxicated in this hotel, I was. There is lack of hygiene and food runs high risks of contamination. They call a special doctor who clears the mess of intoxication when it occurs, and so they keep it taciturn beyond local hygiene authorities hearing. But you pay the doctor and medicine from your pocket as I did....

Whilst not a luxury experience by any means with some dates rooms and decor throughout the hotel (by abroad standards), the Hotel Club Al Moggar contains some lovely gardens and greenery and is well located for marina and beach access (and includes a small area on the beach with sun loungers available for hotel guests) as well as a short taxi ride to the nearby souk. It is also approximately 40 minutes by taxi from the international airport.

The room was large and contained a double and two single beds that were decently comfortable with sheets changed daily without any issues. There were three large wardrobes so plenty of storage though there could be more hangers. A small TV hangs on the wall however all channels but BBC News were in French. The bathroom had a bath with overhead shower with good water pressure and temperature and a bidet. The toilet however was a separate room so I question the usefulness of the bidet then. Me and my partner also had a good sized balcony with a table and chairs that overlooked the entertainment pool which did mean music through the day but it was quiet at night. WiFi was available but it was patchy at times.

There is a small shop (selling mostly fake clothes and bags but also some snacks and confectionery) and ATM in the lobby as well as a person to buy excursions from however we chose not to buy from him as his prices were far higher than those found online.

Both the entertainment pool and quiet pool were clean and a good size and there was plenty of sun loungers available during our stay at the end of September. There was also an entertainment programme which we didn't partake in but seemed to be enjoyed. We did go to the spa for a Hammam and Massage though which was well priced and felt fantastic despite long waits between parts.

Food wise there is the main buffet restaurant for breakfast and dinner which I will come onto. There is also a fast food place, a lounge bar, fish restaurant (we didn't try) and a poolside snack bar.

Service is where the hotel really falls down. Many of the staff are extremely rude and lack basic customer service skills that would be mandatory in most other countries and hotels. Most don't speak good English and act annoyed when you ask if they do. Entertainment staff are pushy and the staff member at the poolside bar was just plain awful to speak to and deal with. Whilst the cleaning staff were excellent and changed towels everyday without fail, the reception staff especially (apart from one lovely woman) could do with some training. We mainly experienced this disgraceful behaviour after me and my partner ended up in the hospital for two nights with food poisoning that we got at the hotel buffet. We had extremely high fevers but were fortunate to have insurance (please buy travel insurance people!) but had to waste 2 days of our holiday in a local private hospital which left much to be desired. Upon our return, we told the reception staff and they seemed completely unbothered and shrugged it off, offering no compensation or refund despite medical proof. This is disgusting and speaks volumes of what the staff actually think of their guests. We are currently trying to secure some refund through Booking to alleviate the hotels awful customer service.

Overall, this is a good hotel for pools and entertainment in an excellent location but just beware of the dated rooms and decor and the terrible customer...

We all have our expectations for hotels and the places we stay in, right? Well. I'll tell you what you should expect from this place.

First of all, what you should expect is that the public areas in this place are spacious and beautiful. The bushes outside are usually shaped into different things such as planes, cars and a castle of some sort. The hotel also has a fast food place by it, just in case the buffet isn't interesting. They serve a lot of vegetables. The system is confusing as well. Free drink at breakfast but expect to pay for it at dinner time. We never had lunch at the hotel but I assume you have to pay for that too. If you're gonna stay here with your family, please just send one person down at first, you don't want everyone dragging their suitcases around when you're looking for your room, cause the system in a bit confusing and you don't want to make unnecessary trips, especially with a heavy suitcase. And also. The lobby is a place where you can smoke.

Now, next thing you should know is that the rooms are different for everyone. But here's what our room was like when we came in and had a look for the first time:

The floor will have tiles. The walls are white. Simple. We had two beds and a table between them. We also had one locker for folded clothes and one closet for coat hangers. They also included a safe in one of the lockers. A bathroom with a shower and a toilet. Sink. There were also two bars of soap by the sink and towels hanging on the racks. We also had an old tv on a stand and an AC.

Upon further stay we realised that we shouldn't walk around in our room without our socks on, cause our feet would get black from all the dirt we didn't see on the floor. So yes. We washed out feet a lot especially before bed. Once we sat down in our beds we realised something seemed a bit wrong. Our bodies weren't exactly greeted softly by the mattress. Instead, the beds were rather hard. This is all about personal preference. But a hard bed is not what we preferred. And we both got out backs hurt in the process. Now we can't do any movements that involves our back without getting pains all over.

On the first day, we tried the AC. It didn't work. So, we had to lay in a rather clammy room. Especially in the morning. The TV was of course a bit old. So like old Tv's do, it made a high pitch noise whenever it was on. I recommend the movie channel. I don't know if you'll find it. It will be texted in Arabic (I guess). So pay attention. Cause you have to rely on your ears to hear. The holder for the shower head was also broken so we had to improvise on where to put the shower head. Either that or we had to hold it.

Now for the thing that bothered our heads the most. The hallway is loud. Really loud. We went on a school trip here. We were often woken up by the washing ladies talking to each other in the mornings. Especially frustrating when we both wished to sleep in. Don't have private conversations in the hallway. People will hear everything in detail.

And lastly The washing ladies don't understand much English. And even if you speak to them in English, they will have difficulties to reply. So it's a plus if you know French.

Good luck at hotel Almoggar Sincerely, the two girls who lived...