Milky Way Desert Camp — Hotel in Caïdat de Taouz

This was to be the highlight of our road trip and promised so much. We were a group of three friends travelling together on a private tour of Morocco over several days staying in a new location every night. I was the organiser/researcher and I delved deeply into every accommodation before we committed. I was impressed by the Milky Way Desert Camp web site which spoke of its luxuriousness (the words 'luxury' or 'luxurious' appear five times in the introductory paragraph alone) and promised WiFi, hot water and electricity. We had travelled for eight hours by car from Fes, with a few sightseeing stop offs on the way, and then an hour on camels to the camp. We were tired, we were grubby. First impressions were poor. It was clear we might be the only guests (two others turned up later), the place looked very careworn and the basic exterior furnishings, those personal to each tent and communal, were tatty. The tents were basic. "Exquisite Berber style interiors"? I think not. I opted for an immediate shower and was greeted by a thin trickle of cold water. My friends left it too late and by the next day there was barely enough water for us to brush our teeth let alone shower. Hot water never made an appearance. My toilet overflowed and I had to take the cistern lid off to stop it overfilling. Electricity is advertised as part of this 'luxury' experience, but be aware this only means dim lighting in the tents and two USB ports. There are no sockets so forget plugging in devices which need power beyond USB. The bedding was old. The pillow cases were rough and bobbly. To temper my review slightly, my travelling companions were slightly less disappointed than I was, and if you are a seasoned camper used to living with limited facilities then your experience will differ from mine, but the publicity quite simply does not live up the the offering. I do appreciate that this is a desert camp and not the Hilton, but these desert camps generally have facilities because they are big business for tourists and you have to provide an honest description of what you are offering. It's always best to underpromise and overdeliver rather than the other way around. The food was fine, but we were too tired and grubby to boogie by the camp fire with the travelling Berber drummers we could hear going from camp to camp so we opted for an early night and an early start the next day. This review makes me sad because I was so looking forward to this part...

EDIT: I decided to update my review and lower the rating from 2 stars (original) to 1 star because of the owner’s unprofessional and rude response.

Instead of addressing feedback respectfully, they publicly accused me of lying and told me to "play it somewhere else." That’s not how a business should treat guests who share their honest experience.

For clarity: I stayed at the camp on the night of October 8th to 9th and posted my review later (next night) after returning to Marrakech. I didn't take photos of the food simply because there was nothing worth photographing, but I do have a picture of the camp taken from inside my tent. Regardless of any disagreement, it's extremely impolite and unprofessional to speak to customers in such a tone. Original review: First of all, the staff were great, very friendly and always ready to help. No issues at all with them

However, the camp overall did not meet my expectations. The food was disappointing: for dinner, we were served bland rice with some vegetables and what was supposed to be a chicken tagine, also tasteless, with more bones than meat. Dessert was a whole pomegranate and a few slices of melon. For breakfast, there was some old bread and croissants with a selection of jams and honey - not terrible, but mostly because I was very hungry after that dinner.

No activities (such as sandboarding, etc.) were provided The music show in the evening was okay, but I went to bed early to catch the sunrise and was woken up several times by cars/quads passing nearby and loud engine noises

The bed was fine, and the toilet was acceptable, but the shower was old and unpleasant to use. The temperature in the tent was either too hot or too cold, but I guess that's just part of being in the desert

The sunrise was absolutely magnificent and made the experience worthwhile - though, of course, that's not exactly the camp's...

We spent one night in this desert camp and unfortunately it did not meet our expectations. It is branded as a 5 stars hotel but unfortunately it does not meet the standards.

The camp is very close to multiple other camps so at night you hear music coming for other camps.

The tent included a bathroom but the facilities and rooms were dated and not very clean. The tent was extremely hot (despite mild temperatures outside), had a chemical smell and had no ventilation. Bathroom was left with traces of prior users (empty shampoo pouches) had no hot water (despite what was advertised) and curtain to divide the toilette from the sink was very old and dirty. Despite being a booking for 2, only 1 old towel was provided and when we inquired for more, equally seriously worn off towels were provided. Some of the advertised activities, sandsurfing, sunrise viewing were not available. When we inquired the night before about which direction we should head towards for the sunrise,  we were vaguely pointed towards a direction with an annoyed mumble. There was only a 10 min musical show around the fire for us when we could hear other camps playing the night away.

Communication with staff of hotel was extremely limited as they had difficulties communicating in anything else but the local dialect and the language of money.

However, you could tell that the staff was doing the best they could with the tools they had been given. Team was small composed of about 3 people, doing all tasks: cleaning, camel rides, luggage pick up, musical entertainment,  all meals and services.

I would recommend skipping the milky way camp unless you are interested in extremely basic facilities, at the opposite hand of the magical desert experience that...