My partner and I have just returned from a five-day trip to Morocco, the first two-nights of which were spent in the Riad Hadika Maria.

To start with the positives, the rooms are relatively clean, and the rooftop terrace is a relaxing place to have breakfast. The breakfast itself is adequate - croissant, crepe, coffee, jam and honey. When I stayed there was wi-fi access with no PIN required; not sure if this was actually there for residents' use though, so I wouldn't rely on it.

Now on to the negatives.

Firstly, there is no hot water. I showered in ice cold water and my partner didn't wash at all. She is quite fragrant, fortunately.

Secondly, none of the doors have locks on the outside. There is a sliding bolt on the inside so you can lock the door whilst you sleep, but you cannot lock the door when you leave for the day unless you have had the foresight to take your own padlock. I did ask the owner if I could borrow a padlock but it never materialised. Consequently we had to take all our valuables with us when wandering around the medina, which only added to our anxiety.

Thirdly, the pool is too small to swim in - not really a massive negative, but I thought I'd mention it in case a keen swimmer chose this place on the basis of the pool.

Finally, and this is a much bigger negative than it may sound (were it not for this factor I would have given it a "3") this place is almost impossible to find. It is located in the middle of 6,000 virtually identical, featureless alleyways with hardly any signposts or landmarks. It is, quite literally, a maze. It took us 2-3 hours of desperate wandering to find our way home each time. The alleys are teeming with quite threatening young men who will pester you and follow you relentlessly in an effort to profit from your misfortune. At first, we naively accepted help from a man who seemed genuinely eager to help us find our way. It ended up quite ugly though when he started demanding (quite a lot of) money and rejecting what I tried to give him (which was all I had at that point). You have to very quickly develop a stern, no-nonsense demeanour and bark "NO THANKS", or "LA CHOUKRAN" several times a minute in order to fend off the constant assaults from moneygrabbing locals.


The owners will provide you with a basic hand-drawn map to help you find your way home, but it is pretty useless. I am quite well-travelled and usually unfazed by being pestered, but the intensity and aggression of the harassment in this area was something else. Me and my partner were left quite exhausted by the time we did manage to get home each time. At one point she became really upset as it looked like we would either be out all night or have to enlist the help of a dodgy teenager who would most likely rip us off and/or threaten us.

It baffles me how a place can sell itself as a tourist destination and yet be this un-user-friendly. A few signposts, some decent maps, some street names, the odd policeman, anything would help make this place less of a nightmare. Yes, it might sound cool to "lose yourself in a labyrinth of patchouli-scented souks amidst a multitude of Berber arts and crafts" but really it's not like that. It's more like endless, desperate gauntlet-running between thousands of unctuous predators bent on abusing you. I am convinced I now know what hell feels like. It is unfortunate that the Riad Hadika Maria is situated right in the middle of all this, as otherwise it is a passable place to stay.

All in all, our stay in Riad Hadika Maria left us with a very bad impression of Marrakech, and we were glad to escape. Not that Agadir was much better - just easier to navigate home amidst the obnoxious salesmen.

I feel bad for giving a bad review but when it comes down to value and safety, there are many other riads to go for. Here's my take when I went Feb 2012.

Pros:
Abdullah the guy working there is really nice. Doesn't speak a lick of English, so brush up on your French or charades skills

Cons:
So hard to find and I mean really hard to find. Problem with that is, if you arrive at night the taxi will drop you off about 3-5 minutes walk away. This part of the medina is difficult to navigate through even in day time and even more difficult if this is your first time to Marrakech. after getting lost and often down dark and scary alleys, I had no choice but to get help from one of the locals which was a huge mistake because they act all friendly to you (generally Moroccans are very nice) and when I tried to negotiate the cost up front they told me no problem, it's okay. Of course, after I was brought to the riad these kids (both around late teens) asked for 200d each (aka ~40 euros). You can imagine the shock. after some discussions they threaten to slash my face and made other threats if I didn't pay 400d. In the end we settled on 150d total (aka 12 euros) but that just left a bad taste in my mouth for my first experience of marrakech. if you think about it, that 12 euros could have upgraded me to a much nicer riad and I wouldn't have had to endure the threats and lost an hour of my time. so lesson learned there is sometimes trying to save some money isn't worth it especially if your life is threatened.

other cons: no toiletries, no wi-fi, no service.

the only reason why i'm not giving it a 1 star is because of Abdullah. after my run in with the punks, Abdullah did walk with me through the medina to get food and water. And the next day he guided me to Jemma El Fna at 7:30am to meet my Sahara tour which was really nice of him.

But like I said, it wasn't worth risking my life to save a few euros. And I felt as a staff he could have protected the interest of his guests. He was just standing there quietly the whole time while I negotiated my way out of a jam.

In case you don't believe me and you still decide to check in to this riad, just know if a kid name Moustafa comes up to you, you better walk the other way.

It's nice Riad, with a little swimming pool in the garden.
Nice rooms, mine was at the ground level, relax area and a terrace where breakfast is served. Free wifi.

Overall it's a good Riad but it takes about 15-20 min walking to get the main square jama el fna.
To get to the square you have to walk through the very narrow streets of Medina and it can be easy to get lost!! Same problem to find the Riad. Any possibility by ourself first times!!!! So, if you want a place to sleep easy to find, go close to the main square. If you want to know an area of the Medina and see al the suk area, staying in a real morocco's Riad, that's the right place.
Riad area was safe, at night as well.

We were staying one night in this poor hotel. It's situated outside of bazaar area. You need to walk loooong way very small roads to reach the hotel. Taxi can't drive those small streets so you need to walk. We broke one wheel from our bag while walking those long bumpy streets. This hotel suits well for backpack travellers but don't go there if you have luggage on wheels.

There is no restaurants nearby. The small streets are like labyrinth with bad lightning. I would advice you to stay indoors when dark comes. We almost got robbed by drug addicts on those streets. It's not safe place at all.

Our room (suite) was quite ok, nicely decorated, but it had unbelievable cold floors and no possibility to lock the door even. Also there was around 5-10 cm holes around the door... so all heated air was escaping from the room. This hotel is situated in very tall stone houses close each others, so rooms are very cold (feels like in some cold cold cold castle).

NEVER AGAIN in this rat hole. Im glad we survived alive from there!