"We have just come home from the Royal Karthago and I noticed when reading reviews theres a lack of english reviews mainly french, the hotel is traditionaly decorated in an authenic style with the rooms in pretty small alleyways decorated in white and blue. The pool area is really good with lots of space and sun beds and no trouble getting one! Theres also the private beach which is nice instead of the pool. The gardens around the hotel are lovely, kept in pristine condition and you can see how hard the gardeners work every day. I thought the arrival could be better straight away it was your room isnt ready and the customer sevice was lacking. You aren't given much information from reception we didnt realise until our 3rd night there was an entertainment area at night and another bar so more detailed information would be good.
The hotel food was excellent and a credit to the hotel there was always a variety and we didn't get bored of it at all, there was always traditional Tunisian dishes, salad, soup, pizza area and every night different choices of stations which was never the same! The only thing I would say is to get another self service drink machine as it was often busy and a queue. One night we went to the tunisian resturant which was a good experience and a nice change to be waitered on. The italian restaurant isn't good at all and not worth going I think they should think about a different option, the main wasnt really italian it was turkey or beef I was expecting more options to choose off the menu. The drinks were typical all inclusive very watered down beer and the wine was weak but nice, the spirits were the best option and the fizzy drinks was proper coke and fanta which we were impressed with. The bar inside the hotel was nicely decorated and stylish which is where we often sat, the pool bar was scruffy which could be improved its obvsiouly well used and the cups were very small so you often needed to get 2/3 at a time.
The only issue we had had here is theres no air con in the rooms in October I've never been anywhere with no air con in the rooms at 27-30 degrees, we asked reception as we just thought it wasnt working and they said about it being turned off from 1st October for Winter and it to do with Government. The room was boiling and having the windows open didnt do much good, I think Easyjet should have made it clearer about there being no air con. I also over heard another guest ask reception about air con so it must be a common question asked.
The entertainment is all in french which we werent bothered about, some of the team are quite full on going around the pool and the same song is played about 4 times a day on repeat with very loud music. For a quieter area we went to the other pool at the top which I think would be good if it was made adult only or the beach.
Most of the guests are french with very little English, Djerba is only just opening up to English tourists again, don't let this put you off you can tell the hotel isnt geared up fully to english guests yet. I expected this from reading reviews but we like visit places that arent full of british people. There isnt anything around the hotel so don't expect to walk out and there be bars and cafe on the beach theres one fish restaurant and then its just deserted I did think there would be more around. Its defintely worth a visit to Houmt Souk with very pretty streets and to buy some traditional pottery we also did a day trip booked through easy jet which we enjoyed!
The hotel could benefit with some improvement to update it such as there were broken tiles around, lick of paint needed, main buffet resturant was tired its a shame the smaller buffet restaurant is alot nicer and the bathroom was very dated in the rooms. Certain areas in the hotel are nicer and well kept compared to others which I understand a hotel of this size its difficult to do improvements when its always open. But you have to remember your in Tunisa and they have different standards, for what we paid for the week it was defintely value for money! We really enjoyed our stay here and I would recommend for a cheap week in the sun!"
