La Renaissance

The hotel itself is very nice, and trendy and also happens to be one of the few places that serves alchohol and has a night club, so attracts young people. The Sky bar is grea and has heaters so if you do get chilly, the staff will happily put them on for you. The price of alcohol, I thought was expensive, so we just bought wine from the supermarket to have in our room. We had several issues, which the staff took a while to resolves, notably the lack of hot water for three days, which considering we were there for 4 days in november wasn't brilliant. We did get a room upgrade though, but that rooms heating / aircon didn't work, neither did the fridge, neither of which were fixed. We also must have been right over the night club as you could hear the music 3 stories up until 2am. Other than those niggly things very well located, 15 mins by bus to the airport costing 30 dhrs. Food was very well cooked, they have a hamman which we didn't use. Its good value for money and does what it says on the tin!

The room was on the small side, but was stylish, modern and clean. The air-con coped with temperatures of over 40° c outside. It didn’t live up to the fridge like standards of coldness my partner had experienced in Dubai earlier this year, but I thought it was fine. The hotel is on a busy junction but we weren’t bothered by road or traffic noise at all. The rooftop pool is small but a great place to swim with views over the city and to the Atlas Mountains, again it was clear and towels were provided, although the number of sun beds is a bit limited. We didn’t eat in the hotel except for breakfast, which was again fine, selection of fruit, pastries, bread, and omelettes, served on the sixth floor restaurant or the terrace by the pool. This is a white room with white furniture, and windows over the terrace and pool. We never drunk enough to have a hangover (see section on the bar below to know why) but even so walking out of the dark lift into the blinding light was a rough awakening every morning. With a hangover it would be horrible, so if you are drinking the night before be warned! Other meals in the restaurant were a lot more expensive and having pushed the boat out on the hotel we tended to eat in the Medina, or sitting outside at small cafes in the nearby side roads, where the food was excellent and about a quarter of the price of the hotel. Many of the cafes and shops around shut at around 5 in the afternoon, and then don’t open again until 9, so wait till its later and cooler before heading out. The bar is expensive too, over £20 for an indifferent bottle of Moroccan wine, but its on level seven and has great views over the city. It also seems to be where a number of well to do young Moroccans hang out and drink, so great for people watching too. Staff were generally friendly, but not all had the same level of English and we did have the odd communication problem. Airport transfers were arranged efficiently if more expensively than a local taxi, however the promised early morning alarm call didn’t turn up, good job we had set an alarm. The hotel is well situated in the centre of the new town, right on a main shopping street and by a bus stop, which was a quicker and cheaper way of getting to the Medina than haggling for a taxi. We were told it was a 25 minute walk to the Medina, but that seems a bit optimistic. It was however so hot and the busses were so easy that we didn’t try. You can walk to the rail and ‘Suprabus’ coach station in about 15 minutes, and its 15 minutes by taxi to the airport. Finally, an unexpected delight is the lift, with a kind of Arabic disco theme: dark with mirrors and colour changing lights, truly fabulous!