This is the most expensive hotel in town, but is only ordinary. It's perfectly clean and comfortable and the food was OK, but at the price I expected better. It's an average hotel at a top (for the area) price.

The only nice thing about the hotel is the nice panoramic view from the swimming pool and the pseudo berber-styled bedrooms. Service is very lacking and the hotel is located about 10 mins' drive away from Old Matmata town, which makes you captive of the hotel as there are no other facilities around for food. The restaurant feels like a canteen and the food, likewise. The room was spacious enough but the room we had had no hot water. We had arrived at night and it was cold during that period. Although the hotel looked empty, they refused to give us another room, telling us that all the rooms were the same as the heater was broken. Well then I wonder why the room my friends were in had running hot water? I ended up using their bathroom instead. So much for service.

The atrium where the rooms are has a kitschy fake camel and well making one feel like the hotel is trying too hard to create a berber themed village. All in all, the hotel does not deserve the 4 star that it claims. It feels more like a 2-3 star accomodation and service is worse than some budget hotel i've stayed. It would probably be more worthwhile to stay in a cheaper acomodation in town.

It was also strange that the night we arrived (past 8pm), there was already a "tour agent" sitting in the hotel lobby, asking us if we want to arrange a 4X4 tour of matmata the next morning! A syndicate operation perhaps? We surely did not request for such a service in advance.

You are better off staying somewhere else.

The hotel is located 2km out of town and has great views over the desert. The architecture is interesting and the hotel caters almost exclusively for desert safari tourists in 4X4 vehicles. The rooms are acceptable but nothing special. The pool looks nice but needs cleaning. The restaurant is like a canteen the buffet evening meal looked ropey and we stuck with the cous cous! The breakfast was no better although the crossaints were outstanding. The hotel is okay for an overnight stay but I would not recommend an extended stay. The reception staff however were very helpful.

A word or warning for independent travellers it is very difficult to get from Matmata to Tataouine directly, there are no buses or taxis. A private driver knows this and the cheapest deal we could find was an outrageous 130 dinar. Instead hire a louage to Medinine 60-70 dinar and then a very cheap louage to Tataouine.

This hotel has an outdoor bar/swimming pool area with a lovely view over the desert - a great place to get away from the tourist botherers in Matmata. It's expensive by Tunisian standards (66TD/person/night half-board) and appears to cater mostly for overnight tour groups. The faux-troglodite style rooms are interesting, but lack windows, which makes them very dark at night. The staff seemed fairly pleasant.

Points to note:

The hotel is about 2km out of town. This was easily walkable in temperatures of 20 degrees C, but may be a bit of a struggle in the summer heat. People hanging around the bus/louage station are more than willing to give you a lift there, for a suitable fee.

The buffet evening meal was surprisingly good - better than many restaurants I went to in Tunisia. However, water and alcoholic drinks were placed on a central table and guests encouraged to drink them. Only later did a man come round demanding money ;)