Hotel review: Friday Attitude, Trou d'Eau Douce (Mauritius)

Hotel review: Friday Attitude, Trou d'Eau Douce, Mauritius
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01. Trip report introduction
02. Emirates B777 economy class, Stockholm to Dubai
03. Emirates A380 economy class, Dubai to Mauritius
04. Friday Attitude Hotel, Trou d'Eau Douce
05. What Mauritius was like
06. Emirates A380 economy class, Mauritius to Dubai
07. Emirates B777 economy class, Dubai to Stockholm
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Location of Friday Attitude Hotel on Mauritius

Friday Attitude is located on the east coast of Mauritius, about an hour by car from the airport. We had already booked a car, and a friendly Mauritian man was waiting with a sign with our names. We arrived at the hotel about an hour before check in started, but luckily our room was ready, and we got our room within minutes. As we were checking in, we received refreshing lemongrass and mint drinks, and we were offered some neck massage, courtesy of the hotel. That was certainly welcome after almost 20 hours on the road.

Welcome to Friday Attitude!

On our way to the check in area

Walking...

Still walking but getting closer!

The hotel grounds were oblong, so it was quite a long walk from the reception to the beach, and our room was located on the ground floor of a two-story building close to the beach.

Here we are! Let's see if our keycard works...

It does!

The room was quite spartan, but they had folded our towels into two swans when we checked in, which was a nice touch. We had a small patio outside our bedroom (but didn't use it much as we saw a cockroach there on our first day - I'm a little entemophobic, but to the defence of the hotel, that was the only cockroach we saw during our ten days here), a simple bathroom, and a fridge that was refilled every day. Drinks (water, coke and beer) were free, but the snacks were not.

Towel swans

Naaaaw

Looking out towards the patio

The patio sofa on the left is where the cockroach was walking around the first day...

Some other amenities included a water kettle, power adapter (we always bring our own, but I think it's great that they provide it for those who don't) and a safety cabinet. We couldn't get the safety cabinet to work, however, but when we called the reception, it only took a couple of minutes until someone came by to fix it. Overall, the staff was very friendly at Friday Attitude, and most of them were smiling most of the time.

Tea and instant coffee

Adapter

Looking back towards the entrance

Here you can see that it was a long walk between the reception area (left) and the beach (right)

Safety cabinet

This bench was actually quite useful, as we stored our suitcases here

Water, Coke and beer was free (and refilled every day), but snacks were not free. Sometimes "All inclusive" doesn't mean all inclusive ;)

One of the biggest cons of the room was that the air was damp. Especially when we had hung our swimsuits to dry. In other words, the air-condition could have done a better job. And don't get me started on the ants... We only saw one cockroach (on the patio), and only one centipede (in the bathroom), but there were a lot of ants. Mostly on the floor (and by the sugar next to the instant coffee), but still... That was another reason for us to store our suitcases on the "bench" below the TV, instead of on the floor.

Decent shower, although the whole floor got all wet when one of us had showered, so the door didn't help much

Like I said before - spartan (but we were not here for the hotel bathroom)

A bar of soap and a shower gel was provided as free toiletries

The hotel beach was a nice beach. It wasn't too crowded, so there were always some sun chairs free. The water and the views were beautiful, but as it was quite windy (it was the Mauritian winter when we visited), it got a little cold after a while. Trou d'Eau Douce is not a big place (and the village itself was twenty minutes by foot from the hotel), so if you're looking for something more than to just relax on a sun chair, make sure to do some excursions as well. We visited a couple of other beaches, as well as the capital, Port Louis.

Great place to relax

Admiring the Indian Ocean with some drinks from the beach bar

Looking towards the southeast from our hotel

Sunrise!

Coconuts!

Friday Attitude had one restaurant, but they also had a small shack that they call the "taba-j" where they served some afternoon snacks, like pancakes and a delicious maize pudding. Most of the time, however, we had our meals in the restaurant. The food was a little boring, to be honest. You'd expect excellent food in a country with a mixture of African and Indian influences, but the Mauritian cuisine disappointed a little. And they passed the fish escolar off as tuna. Escolar is forbidden in Japan since 1977, as it is considered toxic (and if the Japanese say that you can or can't eat something, I'd trust them). Its wax ester content messes with your stomach big time. (In all fairness, it's hard to say if the hotel knew they were passing escolar off as tuna, or if the retailers that they bought it from ripped them off, but this was nevertheless a major flaw of Friday Attitude.) 

The snack bar "taba-j"

Their maize pudding was delicious!

The restaurant

Omelet "a la creole", coffee and ice tea - my breakfast during our ten days here...

The food was OK most of the time, but at the end of our stay here, we were kind of fed up with it...

Pancakes and fresh fruit - the papaya was amazing!

WiFi was decent at Friday Attitude, which helped us book a couple of excursions. We used an outside company instead of the concierge at the hotel, as the hotel's taxi service was more expensive. The pool area was also quite good. It was not as windy as on the beach, but there were also fewer chairs.

By the pool

Hotel pool at Friday Attitude

The pool became gradually deeper, from a kids' section to 2.25 metres deep

The pool by night

It was a perfectly fine hotel. The staff was really friendly. The food was decent (albeit a little boring). The beach was beautiful. But after 10 nights at Friday Attitude, we were still quite happy to leave. We longed for our own food, our own bed, and an apartment without any ants...