We stayed here for a few days in April. There is nothing essentially wrong with the hotel, however bear in mind that 5 star in Tunis (and most other places in Tunisia) is a long way short of 5 star elsewhere. Rooms were ok, but smelt of smoke, despite being a non-smoking room. Double bedrooms in Tunisia also consist of 2 twin beds, not a double bed. The breakfast buffet was adequate, but go early for a decent selection, as it does was not replenished regularly. Don't eat at dinner at t e hotel, when there are plenty of much better and cheaper alternatives elsewhere. Also be careful of the conmen who see you leaving the hotel, then claim to be workers there. They use the old "there's a carpet/Berber/food/craft festival on and my brother has a stall, just follow me" routine. We got that 3 times. Also bargain for the cabs. A cab from the hotel to the airport should cost about 10, not the 30 or 40 we got quoted at the airport.

I was a little suspicious as to the true star grading of this hotel before I got there. At the entrance of the hotel you will see that it has a 5 Star rating by the local tourist board. The reality is that this hotel is more in the region of a 3 star hotel. The building from the outside is very ugly and certainly does not resemble a hotel. The lobby is a rather dated and also very smokey. On both sides there are seating areas and it seemed every person sat there had a cigarette. On arrival to the room I could see that it was clean but a little strange looking. The bed was OK but not very comfortable. The bathroom was OK but I expected better. The general style of the room was again a bit out of date. You could tell it wasn't of an international standard hotel chain. The breakfast was OK but did not really have any healthy options such as Muesli. Again the restaurant was very smokey which I didn't appreciate. I did not have any evening meals there but I did twice have a coffee in the lobby area. That was OK but it was not very hot. The staff are friendly and its location is very central. I don't think I would like to stay there again. I might try the Africana; I'm told by my local colleagues that it's a much better. It was fine for 2 nights as I was on a business trip but would not pick this again as hotel for a holiday with my family.

We visited Tunis on our honeymoon. We expected a warm reception from this “5*” hotel and at least some special treatment. However, the fact that it was our honeymoon was acknowledged on the first day, but we were told that they had no time to decorate our room (despite having weeks of notice) and that this would be done the next day. We waited and waited but no decoration (or anything else) was done. This was despite our travel agents calls to the hotel on many an occasion to ask if they were looking after the honeymoon couple. The hotel’s response to this was to ask us (in a very accusatory tone) if there was a problem after every time that the travel agent called. They could not seem to understand that there was no problem as such, but that they had simply not gone the extra mile that we expected from a 5* hotel. It must be noted that a probable 90% of the guests in this hotel appeared to be there on business. Yet, I believe that a 5* hotel should be able to cater for guests who are there on holiday too! The hotel room itself was nice and spacious and we did have a balcony. It was cleaned every day and some of the maids were nice. It may sound picky, but there were some annoying inconsistencies, such as we only got chocolates on our pillow twice in the week, and only one robe was provided to us in our double room. I think if you pay for a 5* hotel then you have the right to be picky! Breakfast at the hotel was, again, at different standards each day. The good points were that: there was an omelette chef to make eggs on demand; there were fresh pastries available. However, the bad points were as follows: if someone was given a pot of coffee and a jug of milk, the waiters poured the leftovers back into jugs and gave it to the next person; there was little fresh fruit (something that we found all over Tunis actually); the waiting staff were less than helpful and did not bring you plates or cutlery if required; you could not tell what the quality of the food would be like from one day to the next. One day we tried the lunch buffet at the hotel. This was actually very good, but you had to get there early because none of the dishes were replaced. It was expensive but we found that it had a good range of dishes and nice authentic Tunisian food. Another warning for this hotel is not to use the beauty/ spa facility. My wife booked a pedicure, as she had seen a flyer in the hotel room that said it cost 10-15 Dinars. However, when she actually went to the appointment she was told that the price had now changed to 30-40 Dinars!!! There was no apology or explanation for this and the staff seemed upset that we would even suggest paying the price that we had seen it advertised for! The fitness room is reasonable, but consists mainly of a bike, a running machine and a couple of weights machines. The hammam room is also OK as long as you don’t mind stale steam and not much else. Basically everyone in the hotel seemed to want to get money out of you. Don’t get us wrong, if we have good service then we are more than happy to give a big tip and pay a fair price. But we do not like people thinking they can just get at our cash for doing nothing. However, this may not have only been the attitude at the hotel but in Tunis in general. There was a very large issue with the taxi service with the hotel. There appear to be back-handers paid to the staff when you order a taxi from the hotel. When we arrived, they agreed to the taxi scam that got sucked into when we arrived. When you get to the airport, get into a yellow taxi, not a white one. Check that the tariff is number 1 if before 9pm and tariff 2 afterwards (it will be 30% - 50% more). Do not pay more than what is written on the meter, and it should start at 0.380 dinars (at the time of writing.) To give you an idea, the taxi journey to the airport cost 2.5 dinars. The way to the hotel cost 15 dinars once the meter fare had been doubled! However, it is often difficult to flag down taxis on the main street. We experienced a scam on the first day where a local followed us and pretty much forced us into his friend’s shop to buy expensive perfume. To make matters worse he would not leave us alone, followed us into a restaurant and ordered a meal for himself (unbeknown to us.) He then forced us to pay for his meal and we did as we were quite scared at this point. Despite having done this, he still started a fight with me because I wouldn’t pay for him to have beer!! It seems harsh to say so but do not befriend anyone or even talk to anyone in this city!! I’m not normally so cynical ? Finally, some comments on Tunis in general- don’t be fooled by the promise of warm climate and exotic scenery. This is a 3rd world country and it is dirty, scary and not exotic at all! The weather is changeable in April: it is nice but not that hot. If you are going to stay here then we would advise to stay at a hotel nearer to the medina, as this would be more central. Examples are Africa and El Hana, though may be even worse. The common sites to go and see are Carthage and the Bardo museum. Carthage was mostly a waste of time- all the good things to see had been taken out of here and put in the Bardo museum, which was fantastic! There was so much to see here that it was hard to take it all in. If you appreciate beautiful mosaics and ancient statues then you will be fascinated by this place. There were some good cheap restaurants in the city centre. One good restaurant on Avenue Bourguiba was called Capitole. Avenue Bourguiba is the centre of the city and is a useful place to shop, eat or drink. Other good restaurants were found on Avenue de Marseille. A bad restaurant near the hotel was called Le Duc- they seemed to give good food to the locals but we ordered the same dishes and got something that looked totally different! Also on Rue Ghana which runs next to the hotel are plenty of shops to buy water, cafes (much better for coffee) and good places to smoke chicha in the evening if you’re male. Café des Banques is very good, and much preferable to the hotel coffee.

Dirty, bad service, filthy so called spa. Need I say more.

First the hotel lost our reservation, but luckily they had some rooms. The rooms was very expensive for what we got, but it is a generic Western style hotel with satellite TV. Good for business, but we left after one night for a place 1/6 the price.

Wading into the rooftop pool was like sliding between silk sheets - no nasty systemic overload or meltdown due to abrupt temperature change, just pure bliss. It's the only pool I've ever been in where I have not only cooled down and felt refreshed paddling around but not had to spend the first few moments frantically recovering from the shock of cold water colliding with overheated flesh. My sister-in-law and I shared a hotel room while I attended an academic conference and we stayed 7 days at Abou Nawas. The hotel itself is fascinating for its embrace of all things big and ornate and just offside of authentic (which I suppose presented its own charm). Great service, but while we expected to say thank you with a tip to those members of staff who'd been unfailingly helpful and pleasant, we were slightly unprepared for a number of maids we didn't recognise clustered at our hotel room door the day we were leaving. The hotel room was comfortable, well-equipped and the free, fast wireless access was an absolute lifesaver for me! The Tunisian miniature shower gels are beautifully scented with sandalwood. Gorgeous after a long day in the sun! The breakfast buffet was excellent - lovely French-style pastries, delicious Tunisian hot breakfast dishes, breads, loads of fresh fruit. The pan au chocolat was my staple. While there were lots of staff around looking busy, they seemed quite happy to allow dirty plates and dishes to pile up on unoccupied tables, so if you arrived towards the end of the buffet period, you would most likely have to shift someone else's used plates and cutlery off a table yourself and then hunt around for spares from somewhere else. Centrally-located, we walked into the centre of town most nights for dinner (about a 15-minute walk into the restaurant area). The pool made all the difference to the hotel rating and our stay in Tunis. Just divine.

I have stayed at this hotel four times for business in Tunis. It is in the heart of the city at walking distance from most spots that you would want to visit. The service at the hotel is good. It may be more expensive than the norm in Tunis but it is worth it. It has good restaurants and others nearby.

I have stayed at the Abou Nawas on a number of occasions on an extended trip to Tunis. It is a modern hotel (5 star by Tunisian standards), centrally situated in the Tunisian capital. Rooms are spacious, well furnished and equipped. There are 4 restaurants, a fitness facility and swimming pool. Service is friendly, but not always as efficient as one might expect! The breakfast buffet is excellent, and food in the Italian restaurant, La Casa is reasonable. A good bet for business travellers and tourists alike.

Some say this hotel is not really what it's made out to be. Here are my five cents worth, writing from my room in the hotel right now on December 2, 2007: Lobby exudes grandeur, lot's of marble as is often found in flagship properties such as this in "middle income" countries. You will find a virtually all marble bathroom. You will also see the grout between the marble having turned black in 50% of the area, with cracks in the marble itself. You will see dark, low-ceiling hallways that have been redone more with cost than aesthetics in mind, and you will see wall-to-wall carpeting that has quality problems in the installation especially around corners in your room. The door hardware and paint job on door frames inside the room will remind you of some of the worst hotels you may have staid in. On the other hand, the furniture will seem in quite good shape. The bathtub is old, worn down, but originally of very high quality (just replacing the worn off chrome handles to help you get out would already be a significant facelift at a low cost.) What does this all translate to? The problem is that this was indeed a true five star hotel that has been run down without the investment needed to keep it up to standards. I was booked here because the real hotel I was supposed to stay at is booked out - this is an acceptable alternative. The service is interesting - yes, the front desk is curt in the typical older European fashion, but all in all I had some warm experiences, especially with the person responsible specifically for the room. The bar was unbelievable. I was one of only about eight people there, and they had a superb bar pianist whom one could really get into listening to. I ended up staying there much longer than expected. So final comment: Mixed feelings, not all bad, not five star, but the hint of past grandeur, which may help you get over the shortcomings if you need to stay there for whatever reason...