Solo 5* All Inc. Marhaba Palace Hotel, Tunisia - 1 Adult 7 nights 24th Feb - Gatwick Flights/Luggage/Transfers = £431 @ Holiday Hypermarket

We’ve been to Marhaba Palace and we enjoyed it apart from a member of staff stealing a pair of earrings from our safe whilst he was was supposedly changing batteries as the code wouldn’t set. I was sitting in the room at the time about 12 foot away and never saw a thing. As soon as he was gone I reset the code to something different to what it had been and I knew right away that the earrings were missing. I went down and got my husband in from the pool and we went straight to the reception desk and complained. I could identify him no problem but they were not really bothered and suggested I had mislaid them. We asked for the police to be called and were asked to wait but they never appeared and probably were never called so we complained again. This time they brought the chap into reception and asked him to empty his toolkit in front of us. Funnily enough, no earrings. So that was that as far as they were concerned. Not happy about this we had a quick coffee and decided to go up to our room and call the rep. As we were coming out of the lift at the opposite end of the floor from our room, who should we spot but the same chap coming out of our room and hot footing it round the corner. He hadn’t seen us so we kept quiet and headed into to the room to see what the hell he had been doing in there. Guess what was lying on the floor about five foot inside the door? Yep, one earring and the other was on the floor in the bathroom! We both tried numerous times standing at the safe and throwing the earrings as hard on to the floor as we could and no way was it possible for them to have reached the positions we found them in. Most likely he realised that we were not going to let this go and took the chance to return them and make it look like I was in the wrong however he didn’t have the new safe code so threw them on the floor and scarpered. Needless to say we went straight down to reception and got the manager again. Told him what we had seen and had found and suggested most strongly that the member of staff needed sacked. That didn’t happen while we were there but each time he saw us strolling in the grounds or at the pool bar, he took off sharpish in the opposite direction!
Despite this, we had a good time. The staff in the dining room were lovely as was our cleaning lady. I would say though it’s more of a 4 star hotel. 5 star is gilding the lily a fair bit.
If you want to stretch the budget and get a sea / pool view room, you will need to request 4th floor or higher otherwise you can’t see over or through the palm trees. Not sure about the view from the the two wings but that’s certainly true for rooms in the centre section. Try to avoid rooms overlooking the front approach as it can get rather noisy at times as the main drag to Sousse passes by the gates and when we went there was constant traffic, a taxi rank, pubs and a disco club across the road.
Port el Kantaoui is a lovely spot especially the main square and round the harbour area with lots of good restaurants there. It’s lovely to stroll around the harbour both day and night and there are lots of big expensive looking yachts to gawp at. Another nice thing to do in the evening is go to the main square and watch the free light and music display which co-ordinates with the fountains. The medina / souk in Sousse is worth a visit. Lots of tourist tat along with local shopping such as fruit and veg, sticky sweet goodies and plenty fresh spices and herbs. There are loads of gold shops in the inner reaches off the main alleys. If you do take an organised tour, try to book for the day trip to El Jem. It’s a coliseum - smaller than that in Rome but more complete and very atmospheric, especially as you can go underneath the arena and follow the same paths that the gladiators and those about to be chucked in with the lions for punishment trod centuries ago. When you reach the steps that lead up into the arena, the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. Great for adults and kids alike.
We had been told that the trip to Tunis and Carthage is good too if you like history but we didn’t go because there was a lot of unrest up there at the time (2016 and 2017) and even cruise ships were not doing tours there. All is back to normal now and we hope to go back to Port el Kantaoui this May. (edited)

£385 from Manchester

Great if you like rain