Have just returned after 2 weeks at this hotel. We had a delay of a few hours on our flight out with Thomsons which obviously wasn't perfect but once we got going we were really looking forward to the start of our holiday. The flight was fine as was immigration at Monastir airport. We quickly made our way to the transfer bus and then 10 minutes later we were at our hotel. All of us had to fill in forms which took about 10 minutes and then we were taken to our room. We had booked a pool view family room and were shocked to be shown to a two bedded room with a view of the tennis courts? I went back to reception and after some arguing, where the chap tried to tell me i'd have to wait a day or two for my booked room, i was shown to a room now facing the pool but with just a double bed in it? So back to the reception. This time the chap tells me i can have my booked room the next day. Obviously they expected me to share my bed with my wife and teenage son. After a few raised voices they found a room with a double bed and a bed settee type thing cramped right up against the balcony doors? My wife was fed up by now so she said to take it. Not a great start to our holiday!
We unpacked and went to dinner where we encounterd some very good food and some pretty disgusting food. The pasta and pizza dishes were fresh and good. Some of the pre cooked stuff was cold and dry and some lacked flavour. We hoped that this was a one off but it proved to be poor most mealtimes and i'm not really a fussy eater at all. We tended to live on the pasta and pizza. The service in the restaurant was good at all the dinner servings we attended. The lunch service was chaos though and you'd usually finished eating by the time you were given a drink! Very odd that this hotel does not do a snack type service through the day. I've stayed at many all inclusive hotels and this is the only one where snacks were unavailable?
Onto the pool. The pool area was great with many good quality and comfortable loungers. Unfortunately we had to get up before 0630 every day to get one. The reason being the pool boy would reserve most of them every morning for people who had payed him to do so. Not only this but he also had some towels of his own he used to reserve beds with and then wait until someone approached him and sold those beds to them. I've never seen anything like it anywhere else and i refused to play ball.
There were 3 bars situated around the pool areas where the service was variable to say the least. Some days you could get served straight away some days the staff would just ignore you and talk amongst themselves. They also thought it was ok to use glasses around the pool which i've never known before. On 2 occasions i found broken glasses around the pool which could of easily cut a childs foot. Very odd.
The evenings for my family were fine as we would just retreat to the Piano bar and relax. The service in this bar was excellent. We did venture outside one evening but the entertainment was shockingly poor and getting drinks was a hassle. Also the bugs were all over us which wasn't pleasant.
We did 1 excursion to the ampitheatre at el jem which was interesting but be prepared for being hassled on the walk to and from the site. I also did scuba diving through the company who give a free try in the pool. I was told i'd be going at 1430 but didn't get picked up until 1630. The whole thing felt a little rushed from then on . Even so i had an excellent time. I also did the parasailing from the beach in front of the hotel. This was fantastic and well worth the 30 dinars.
In conclusion we had a good time but it could of been so much better. The room bebacle at the start of the holiday was nothing short of a disgrace. We had booked over 12 months in advance so the hotel has no excuse for not having our room available. The staff were both excellent (piano bar) and poor (Beach/pool bar). The sunbed situation for a platinum hotel was just appalling.
I was told on the day we were leaving that Thomsons were stopping sending guests for the time being due to the long list of complaints they were receiving. This is a shame as the hotel grounds and location are great it's just a few little things need fixing.

I can not speak highly enough of this hotel - it is SPECTACULAR in every sense... total paradise and I have been back 6 times.... this year they have refurbed it to a 5 star rating - and it really is very special. Hope I can afford to return again soon

23.07.2008 to 06.08.2008

The Thalassa Monastir is a great hotel for a relaxing holiday. It sits right on the beach and is only a matter of 5 to 7 minutes transfer from the airport. Aircraft noise is absolutely minimal, considering it

The food was not too bad, there is plenty of choice to choose from, try to get to the food sitting early, if you go late the food is not as hot but still ok,

The hotel is very, very clean, can not fault it in any way.

The location is great for the airport transfer and only a couple of mins from the train station, you are not disturbed by the airport across the road.

The hotel staff are excellent, nothing was too much trouble, they work very hard to please you.

Have just returned 2 days ago from this wonderful hotel. Had read a few bad reports but am happy to say none of them were correct. We arrived at 12.45am the hotel porters were waiting to help you with cases before and after check in. the hotel is very clean and well maintained staff very helpful and friendly and CLEAN.

The food wasnt that bad either a wide selection to choose from morning and evening. They will cook omletes for you while you wait I would recommend this very nice they were too.

The entertainment wasnt that good but maybe because it was fairly quiet a the hotel that week.

The location of the hotel is right on the door step to the airport you can walk it there in a few mins, don't worry you dont get that much noce from the plane though and lastly it has its own private beach is is very clean and well looked after. Very powdery white sands.

I would recommend this hotel if you are wanting a relaxing break not much to do appart from worship the sun.


The hotel has security on the entrances so any old tom dick or harry cannot wonder in. This was good too.

At the moment less than 10% of guests are English, so food is mostly catered for the continental Europeans. We found it quite nice though, although no full English breakfast, so if that's a must for you, then don't go here. We loved it though, pancakes, cheese, salami, omelette's, pastries for breakfast and a mix of nice meat/veg/pasta dishes for lunch and tea.

Another common complain I heard was lack of alcohol, but I thought there was lots of choice. No cocktails during the day, but your selection of 3-5 different ones at night, plus spirits and mixers were very strong.

Staff mainly spoke French, so was a bit of trouble getting them to understand you sometimes (asked for 2 cokes , ended up with 2 coffees) but very friendly.

First choice, along with one of the English speaking hotel guides organise English evenings so you don't feel left out, and most of the music they play is English.

Just got back from 1 week holiday at Thalassa Hotel in Skanes. Had a great time.

No problems at the airport and transfer to hotel only takes approx 5 min. Checking in very easy and porter took luggage to room for us. A small tip does wonders for the rest of the stay.

Room very clean and nice size for family of 3. Cleaner very plesant and happy to help if we needed anything. Room cleaned and towels changed everyday.

Although there was a variety of food, not the best. Evening meal better than breakfast. Can get freshly made omelettes and pancakes - best sticking with them.
Going with Thomson Platinum we got a free meal in the al-a-carte restaurant which was very nice.

There are no shops of any type around the hotel. Caught the train (which is by the airport) to Monastir which was very easy to do. Takes approx 20 min. Caught taxi to Sousse for a days shopping. Went into the medinas in both towns. Can get tiring with shop owners constantly trying to get you into their shops - they even follow you down the street. Have to haggle for most items - be careful as you can get ripped off. Best to check prices in the fixed price shops first to get an idea of what you should you pay.

Most of the Hotel staff were great. Didn't find reception or the Health centre staff very friendly - but the waiters, animation team etc great. Give a small tip and the service is very good.

Evening entertainment not great but the animation team did try hard. Daytime activities varied but tended to be on the beach or around pool relaxing.

As we went as the end of August, the hotel was not very busy and therefore had no problems with overcrowding in or around the pool. Have to get sunbeds fairly early though. Best to put towels down on the way to breakfast. The beach was lovely, white sand and the water was clear and warm.

Overall, had a great holiday and will definately go back again.

I have read most of the comments and as a well seasoned holidaymaker can only imagine that they must have stayed in very poor accomadation prior to this holiday.

Firstly the hotel is not a Thompson platinum those whom have stayed in such will know this and its star rating is for the closeness to the beach and certain facilities on offer.

The food mediocre and nothing special to write home about I visited the kitchen and glad I did on my last day.

We had a resident spider on the lamp by the bed and this stayed put along with other bits that should had been cleaned the whole two weeks towells were threadbare and we stop complaining and used our own.

Be very careful of your mini bar and drinks put to the room ,we saved all our tabs and marked them and when we went to book out they had not one of our marked tabs but ones they made up,when shown the marked copies there was some animation in the native tongue and they threw theres some

After reading all the reviews we set off on our holiday thinking it was going to be a total disaster. No holiday excitement, was even near to what we was expecting, after reading the reviews about this hotel it totally took our holiday excitment away which was most disappointing.

This was the best holiday that we have ever had and we have been goin away for 15 years.

Food,beer,entertainment,night life and staff, beach,apartment,animators,pool,cleaners, I dont think Ive ever been anywhere as clean. Yes there is as a smell which I can only think of being is the seaweed from the sea, which certainly didnt put us off our holiday. Everything was absolutely spot on.

We would definately go back and we cannot fault this hotel in anyway.

Having read all the previous reviews about the Thalassa on this site before we went, we had a very full picture of what to expect.

By far the majority of people had rated it very highly in all but location. We have to agree.

We arrived at Monastir airport at 8pm and then spent about an hour doing customs and waiting on our transfer coach for what we knew would only be a five minute journey to the hotel. If we hadn't had transfers included then a couple of taxis would have been a lot quicker.

No one could fail to be impressed by the appearance of this hotel. The sweeping driveway and glass fronted and columned entrance certainly make an impression straight away.

We found the waiting reception staff to be very efficient and insisted that we didn't have to fill in the arrival cards straight away and that we should make our way to the restaurant for our evening meal as it was nearing the end of the sitting. We thought this might mean that we would not have much to choose from. How wrong we were. We were immediately bowled over by the amazing buffet on offer. The choice was endless. Soups, starters, salads, roasts, pastas , fish, vegetarian, 4 other meat dishes, and Tunisian specialities all beautifully presented and followed by a mouth-watering selection of 20 or so desserts , fruit , ice creams and cheese. The dishes were different every night of our 10 day stay so we were always spoilt for choice. We usually were shown to the same table for meals and this was great as we got to really know the waiters and they us. They were really efficient in clearing away dirty plates and with drinks (more on drinks later).

Breakfasts were equally impressive with a vast choice of breads, croissants, cold meats, cereals, yogurts, crepes and a variety of cooked options to suit all.

After our relaxing first meal we checked in properly and shown to our rooms by the porter with luggage in tow.

Although we had booked two rooms, we hadn't expected them to be together so it was a pleasant surprise to find us and our girls in adjoining rooms with the convenience of interconnecting doors. The rooms were spotless, well furnished and of a reasonable size. The bathrooms especially were spacious and in a very good state. Both rooms had TV's and fridges (ours was stocked with a mini bar) Hair dryers were provided but no kettle/tea /coffee making facilities. We had gleaned this from a previous reviewer and as we have to have a cuppa first thing in the morning we took with us a travel kettle with tea bags etc and this proved to be very worthwhile on numerous occasions.

Our rooms were cleaned and tidied up every day about mid morning, with no problems at all. The hotel is shaped like a U with the pools in the middle. As we had not paid the supplement for a 'Pool view' , our rooms on the fourth floor faced outwards over the sea and some barren land adjacent to the hotel. This wasn't all that attractive but it didn't detract in any way from our enjoyment. The sun came up shining into our room every morning which was great. At least there was no building work going on although I suspect that the land next door is owned by the Thalassa and is being kept as a barrier between them and other hotels up the road.

There was a small safe in our room