Hammamet

This is the third time I visited Hammamet as a base to holiday in. I first visited 2 years previously with an ex of mine to a hotel called Aziza in Hammamet with a Thalassotherapy centre. It was beautiful, great service, great views, older hotel and decor, but the hotel was definately at it's 4*rating. The next year I went back to the same hotel and this time for 2 weeks, all inclusive.. loved it. (Oh, one tip, do NOT clean - even if accidentally- your teeth in tap water....not good for the system...was a little ill on a bus trip to Carthage the second year...I blame the excessive vino with dinner the night before for making it slip my mind!)

The third year (this trip) my friend and I decided to go. She was a little concerned, two blonde girls in an Arabic country, and had heard all kinds of stories about it.

But having been before, I was confident we'd be fine, and, wouldn't you know, we loved it.

This time, we couldn't get booked in the Aziza (A good sign for a hotel surely) and booked instead the Sol Azur in Hammamet. We were put in, what I can only describe as a basement, where the waist height of the balcony was at eyelevel with the soil, so the room was dark and damp. So after a false start, and word with reception, we managed to change rooms to one on a higher floor, which was a different ball game altogether!

Hotel was a great base, and Hammamet medina is always worth a visit. The locals are, as I found them, very friendly, if a little overbearing but if you attempt to speak Arabic to them, even if it is a "no thanks" then they leave you alone much faster, and are really lovely to be around.

Put it this way, a local waiter gave me his mobile phone to use to call home (Ireland) when the pay phones were broken, and INSISTED I used it (we had an argument...lol, and he won) which was very kind of him! And a local restauranteur made food for us - not on the menu - but homemade dishes just to show us what the family cooking was like at home (We drew the line at going to the family for dinner!)

Really white, broad beaches, and Aziza and Sol hotels are on their own beaches. Even the public beach at the medina is nice, and full of lovely little fishing boats with coloured and peeling paint. Worth a trip. Careful of the 'gifts' from locals, it is illegal to beg and so they gift you items or flowers and then ask for payment for them, again, say 'no thanks' ideally in Arabic and you will be fine.

I'd go back tomorrow...except I have a huge list of travels I am trying to work my way through so won't be back for a while. :)