Impressive lobby with beautiful pieces of furniture and African art work displayed in the lobby. Great infinity edge pool with pool bar with the sea beyond. The beach, however, is all rocks and the hotel is close to the port, so how desirable it is to go in the sea is a question. Some very pleasant staff, but none appear to have received any training on what service means.

The hotel's architecture is a bit strange in that many of the rooms have views blocked by the front of the hotel so the view is of the roof of the arcade and a bit of the entry to the hotel. The sea-side views are hopefully not so obstructed.

Checking into my room, I found a dirty toilet and sheets that had not been changed although the beds had been made up. A manager came to my room to check and was very apologetic and the sheets and bathroom were cleaned. Unfortunately, for 6 days at the hotel, there was something wrong every day -- no towels one day, smelly sheets two days, A/C that didn't work, no amenities (same little soap bar for 6 days), no water bottles (they normally provide 2 complimentary water bottles/day - most days, I received none unless I called to get them). From hearing other peoples' stories, it appeared that those of us on the 1st floor had uniformly poor experiences while those on the 2nd floor had good experiences.

The restaurants are another story -- at breakfast, you cannot sit and talk after they close the buffet. The wait staff will literally come and take away your plate and cups as you are still eating or drinking as they want to get set up for lunch. And they can be quite aggressive. The prices are ridiculous -- $60 for the buffet and about $40 for anything on the menu -- none of the food is very fresh as Djibouti imports everything. Food is prepared in strange ways -- e.g., pasta bolognese has meat, but no tomato sauce. Most dishes do not resemble what they say they are. The sushi is to be avoided as, I understand, are the pizzas, which several people said were the worst they had had anywhere. On the buffets, the food sits for hours -- including salads with mayonnaise that were not kept chilled. The ice cream was wonderful and a real delight -- the mango was like biting into a chilled piece of fruit.

In the little cafe for sandwiches, you can wait 20 min for a simple sandwich -- they call them paninis, but mostly they are not hot or grilled (when I asked for one that was hot and well grilled, I was served a cold sandwich -- the waitress told me that after 20 min, the grill was just starting to heat up). It is faster to go up to the counter and get what you want -- including the bill -- but you are still in for a wait. We found that the food from room service was the best in the hotel.

A colleague and I wanted peanuts one day, something found easily in town, and were told none of the restaurants had peanuts and we should buy them in the shop. The shop in the hotel has computer accessories, but almost no food stuffs and nothing local -- a very meager selection in a nice large space.

The business center and internet access are free (except for printing at US$1/page) but there seems to be a block/filter on what websites can be accessed. Even accessing email or sites like Expedia and the BBC were difficult if not impossible. Some of us also found difficulties in cell phone reception in the hotel and also in Djibouti.

One begins to feel like a sucker staying here -- you are gouged for every dime possible and at these rates, it would be better to stay at a more modest hotel that actually delivers. And it's difficult to see this as a resort hotel. There were families there, but it doesn't seem very family friendly.

Of concern, if accurate, is that one of the staff told me that many of them work 12 hour shifts 6 days/week for a salary of about $325/month (at a hotel where one night is more than that). If this is an international hotel chain, one would think they would have more ethical business practices.

If you have to stay here, bring your own snacks and buy fruit and water in town (at about 1/6th the cost and fresher).