Four Seasons Hotel Tunis — Hotel in Tunis

This hotel was the thirteenth Four Seasons we have visited. It is certainly not the Four Seasons with the most perfect service, but it is the Four Seasons with the friendliest and most helpful staff. |At first, we had problems communicating with the hotel, as emails kept getting lost and couldn't be found even in the spam folder. So if you don't receive a reply, try sending your email to a different address.|Transport to the hotel is provided by a 20-year-old Volkswagen Transporter. We would have expected slightly better transport from the Four Seasons hotel.|At the beginning, there was a misunderstanding because we were upgraded to a more expensive suite, but we specifically wanted the cheaper one because there were three of us and we needed two bathrooms and two toilets. We were upgraded to a suite with a better view, but it only had one toilet and one bathroom, which was problematic for us. If you are booking a suite with two bathrooms as a family, insist on this suite.|Keep in mind that the hotel is structurally far from the construction standards you may be used to at the Four Seasons Jumeirah, where the sound insulation is very good. Here, on the contrary, you can hear everything.|As for the room, the furnishings were average, but the room was really spotlessly clean.|The service at the pool is absolutely excellent. The pool is huge, I estimate about 30 meters by 12. Some previous reviews mentioned that it was difficult to get sun loungers. This did not happen to us, as we made a reservation in advance. It is true that on weekends, people from outside the hotel also come to the pool, and in the afternoon it was quite crowded. However, the pool is so huge that we never felt cramped. There are a lot of staff around the pool, and your requests are fulfilled before you even have time to ask. We have never experienced such perfect service at any Four Seasons hotel, with the possible exception of Four Seasons Jumeirah.|The beach is not as bad as some reviews might suggest. There are cabanas available. The beach has yellow sand and is clean. My only criticism here is that there is no service, so you can't order any drinks, which is why most people just come, swim and leave. You only get a bottle of water to drink.|As for food, we definitely recommend the poolside restaurant called Blue. It serves both lunch and dinner. The chef is George, a fantastic cook with experience in Michelin-starred restaurants. He specializes in Greek cuisine, and don't be afraid to ask him for anything that's not on the menu. His marinated seabass is absolutely fabulous, as is his tzatziki. George is also the head chef at the fine dining restaurant The Creek. Both restaurants are run by Mr. Amr, so if you need anything, just ask for him. |Both Blue and The Creek are known not only for their great food but also for their perfect service. Bravo Mr. Amr, bravo George.|We recommend that you make a reservation at Blue for Saturday evening. There is live local music and the fantastic singer Hanadi Nsiri performs. The restaurant is completely full on this day, especially with beautifully dressed Tunisians. You need to book in advance for this evening.|Another place to eat is right next to the reception and is called Salon Alyssa. This restaurant (bar) is not run by Mr. Amr and is not very good. Neither the quality of the food nor the service is great. We do not recommend it.|The weakest point of the hotel is the concierge team. They organized a trip to Sidi Bou Said for us and did nothing but book a guide through an agency. We strongly advise against a trip to Sidi Bou Said. It is a Greek-style town, the likes of which we have all seen dozens of on the Greek islands. This one is no different, only significantly dirtier, and the harassment from local vendors is very aggressive. There are thousands of tourists in Sidi, and the prices in the miserable cafes are astronomical. |On the other hand, the ancient monuments in Carthage are fantastic and there are practically no tourists. We especially recommend the Roman baths.|We were also curious to see if it was true that hotel guests were bothered by cigarette smoke. The truth is that Tunisians do smoke a lot, but at the same time, we never found ourselves in a situation where we were bothered by smoke more than was tolerable. To be honest, when someone happened to bother those around them with the smell of Cuban cigars, it wasn't the local Tunisians, but inconsiderate Europeans who think they look like Winston Churchill with a cigar in their mouths.|I can't help comparing it to a similar hotel, the Four Seasons Astir Palace in Athens, where we stayed recently. The Athens hotel is significantly better built, more luxurious, and roughly two to three times more expensive. But that's about it. Lax staff, poorly managed hotel. Poor cleaning. In Tunis, you get all the services in a completely different quality and from people you will love at first sight.|On Tripadvisor, you can read in the summary review that the service at the hotel is inconsistent. Yes, sometimes it really is. On the other hand, every little mistake is more than compensated for by a broad smile. You really won't find such friendly staff anywhere else. So, our final rating is five stars out of five. We will definitely be back...

Do you want to pay a good chunk of change to be made to feel like you’re a terrorist? Come stay at the four seasons hotel in Tunisia, where they will scan your car for bombs and push you to pop open your trunk EACH time you try to drive into your hotel. expect them to xray each of your personal belongings before being granted the honor of stepping foot into the lobby area. Oh but the prisoner treatment doesn’t stop there, be prepared to be asked several times to confirm your cell, I mean, room number while trying to visit the breakfast area, the pool, the coast area by marching mindless drones with walkie talkies. Do you want to be reminded of work? Be surrounded by hundreds of uptight, rude, loud businessmen who have nothing better to do than complain about a dumb waiter or yell at an assistant, sounds relaxing! How about enjoying the authentic and Tunisian cultural American catered cuisine? Do you want to be charged unexpectedly for a breakfast that is complimentary, 170 dinars for a luxury meal of eggs with cheese, cheese with eggs! Be blessed that they have harissa and Shakshouka with no egg in it among the pitifully low food choices. Talk about culture, stay in a hotel in Tunisia that reeks of lifeless brutish brown Saudi hallways that reek of Saudi cologne. Did you expect to be in the beautiful gammarth, surrounded by the iconic pristine blue waters and clean air? You’ll be in for a treat, as you will be surrounded by a fortified prison, with dirt around, lots and lots of dirt in an empty dusty unmaintained street that makes the Sahara desert look like the utmost cleanliness standard. In the hotel, smoking is allowed for you to fill your lungs with second hand cancer so you’ll get your fresh air too. If you aren’t driving a BMW, Mercedes, or Porsche into potholes, then don’t bother expect valet to bring your car to the front without whining if they have to. How this hotel has a 5 star rating shows the grossly unjust strong hold monopoly chains have over genuine and proper businesses. If I can give this place negative stars, I would. Don’t give a penny to this hotel, otherwise they’ll greedily take it and offer snobby, soulless, tasteless vibes in return and surely suck out the joy any vacation has to offer in this otherwise beautiful coastal area of Tunisia. I am a reasonable person, so now let me mention the few things that were good about the hotel. The staff for cleaning folded our clothes that laid around the room daily, and offered water throughout the day which was helpful and nice, the view of the sea from our room was aesthetic, and the director was apologetic when we complained about the many individuals who kept prompting us for our room number while walking on the premises. Please do not stay here, I would personally give you better recommendations than this vacation and good vibes killer....

Prior to visiting we had spent 10 days traveling Tunisia, starting from Djerba and slowly working our way up north. I say this as it meant we knew the general standard of hotels throughout Tunisia and there is definitely no argument this was a significant leg above any where else we stayed. The grounds are well looked after, the view from our room was stunning and the breakfast location is brilliant.

However, once the positive initial impression had worn off the problems started to show. Our first lunch order was just, slow, our drinks arriving after the first course and then being warm by the time the main arrived. One of the saving graces being Issam (our waiter) was fantastic, but there’s only so much you can do after waiting 30 minutes for drinks! This problem followed through into the evening, where we had to call 3 times (after having already ordered through the app) over the space of 2 hours to get water delivered to the room, weirdly the ice we ordered initially arrived very quickly. This was at 10pm, as you can imagine , pretty annoying when you want to go to sleep. The following day we ordered drinks at the pool, which also took over half an hour to arrive. It was all just frustratingly slow when taking into consideration the premium you were paying to be there. 

Another major frustration during the stay was the key card, it just refused to work reliably and had to be reset multiple times at the reception. With the worst occasion being when it packed up all together and maintenance had to be called. This was not a quick process… We ended up waiting about an hour before just leaving and going to lunch outside of the hotel. To be fair this was compensated by removing the breakfast bill for 2 days of our stay, however, this was only offered separately and a day after due to a separate misunderstanding. During check-in I’d asked whether breakfast was included and had been told our booking included it. When when it came to checkout it transpired it was in fact only included for the first day and not the other two.

The bathroom was also damp with the paint bubbling up and coming off round the skirting board.

It just doesn’t tick any box, more than double compared to elsewhere in Tunisia and not cheaper than comparable luxury hotels in other countries, with service to...