A holiday in a palace built by the King of Morocco. What’s not to like? Travel,
IF you haven’t heard of the Royal Mansour in Marrakech yet, you will soon. The hotel is one of just six chosen to star in the upcoming BBC series about the most extraordinary hotels in the world, fronted by food critic Giles Coren and MasterChef judge Monica Galetti.
The hotels have been picked for various reasons — one is fashioned out of ‘snice’, a mix of snow and ice sculpted into rooms (admission to the sauna is free); another is set on an island, built by a returned islander to boost local employment.
And the Royal Mansour? It must have been chosen for its utter fabulousness. No doubt Giles and Monica will pick over its three restaurants, overseen by three-starred Michelin chef Yannick Alleno, to haunt the kitchens and peer into pots, grill the staff and run a finger along the skirting boards in the guest quarters.
But I doubt they’ll find anything to tut-tut over. Royal Mansour is not just a five-star hotel, it’s a supernova of a palace. The food is astonishing. The service happens as if by telepathy. And the 53 individual riads that serve as guest quarters are exquisite. No wonder the Beckhams love it (or at least so rumour has it — no member of staff would be indiscreet enough to name the star-studded guests who stay here). And while I’m at the superlatives, the prices are also pretty stratospheric at nearly €1,000 a night, before you even think about a cup of mint tea.
The hotel was built six years ago at the command of King Mohammed VI of Morocco and is very much the country’s showpiece.
It sits on the eastern edge of the medina in Marrakech, with roughly four hectares of gardens, a testament to what can be achieved when there is no limit to budget and grubbing irritations like profit margins sit well down the list of priorities.
The guest riad complex is built to mimic the maze of the medina with high terracotta-painted walls and pretty, narrow streets punctuated by courtyards with tall palm trees and everywhere water flows in mini canals and fountains. It took over 1,000 craftsmen three years to complete and is a beautiful confection of carved cedar, delicate stucco work and mosaics. It’s understated and serene — nothing like the bling of Burj al Arab in Dubai, supposedly the world’s most luxurious hotel.
While I’m staying, the King of Morocco’s brother is also in residence. Our paths don’t cross though. He and his retinue take the four-bedroom Grand Riad, which sits in its own compound and has a hammam and two pools, one on the roof, and a larger one at ground level, a billiard room and marble bathrooms — it costs from €35,000 a night.
About 460 staff tend us pampered guests, that’s roughly five staff per guest. They smile and chorus, “Good morning, Mrs Power,” each time I pass through the marbled and mosaicked lobby. They appear magically every time I get lost in the medina maze and patiently lead me back to my riad, or the spa or the pool. Occasionally I come across one of them
The hotel has an underground city built to service it
perfecting the grains of sand that are sculpted into the shape of the hotel’s logo in the ashtray outside my riad door, or sweeping away a brazen leaf that has dared to fall on the path.
But mostly, the staff are invisible — the hotel has an underground city built to service it and allow its workings to grind away unseen. Each floor of my three-storey riad has a door that connects down to the labyrinth of passageways, which are wide enough for a car to drive along.
The doors allow the staff to come and go invisibly to do things like reset the air conditioning to my preferred setting, switch my lights on and do origami to the end of the loo roll. Plates of sweet morsels appear on the lounge table, brownies, say, or baklava-like offerings or, one day, four perfect pomegranates lined up with precision to look like an art installation.
This is all heaven but I feel a bit out of my league — I’m used to soup and a sandwich at lunch. I go to the new Le Jardin spot — an al fresco restaurant by the pool where a mezze lunch of lobster sushi, tomato tartar, calamari, lamb shoulder, paper-thin slices of beetroot marinated in citrus juices and slow-cooked overnight, comes at us in waves — I plop my battered handbag on the ground at my feet. There’s a swoosh and whitegloved hands whisk away the same handbag — H&M circa 2014 — and place it on its very own bag pedestal. There it sits through lunch for all the world as if it were the crown jewels, screaming, ‘Look at me, look at me.’
The Irish mammy in me is squirming.
Tempting as it is to stay within the walls of the hotel, there is a buzzing city just beyond its battlements. I pause at the Koutoubia Mosque, the 12th century minaret that is visible for miles and was the model for the Giralda in Seville and the Hassan
Rates at Royal Mansour are from £782 (approx €917) per night including breakfast. Royal Mansour has a Short Break Package which includes: - Two nights’ stay in a Superior one-bedroom Riad with upgrade to a Premier one-bedroom Riad on availability - Daily full breakfast served at La Table restaurant or in your Riad - One dinner for two at La Grande Table Marocaine - One hammam per person (60 mins) - Fast-track service upon arrival and departure at Marrakech Airport - Private transfers from and to Marrakech Airport. Prices from €2,100. Flights: Ryanair offers nonstop flights from Dublin to Marrakech from approx €222 return