Al Sahel Desert Islands Resort and Spa by Anantara

Bjørnar Nesland

Stayed three nights with my family and my parents April 2024. Positives: Extremely nice and spacious villa. Nice private pool. Cool island, and it feels like you are in Africa. Good excursions (saw a lot of giraffes!) Negatives: The service from the restaurant was not good. We ordered two times to our villa to eat dinner outside by the pool. Both times the food took almost 2 hours, and both times they had either missed parts of the order or gotten it wrong. The staff tried their best, so 5/5 for effort, but a lot of the outcomes were a bit less "professional", in lack of a better word, than expected for such a fancy place like this. Verdict: Will we come back? Definitely! The positives outweighs the negative too much, and I believe we were just a bit unlucky. Recommended!

x AK x

I haven’t given it 5 stars just because of the lack of privacy and transportation, however, the service is a 5 stars service, specially IRADA who kept in contact with us till we solved our issue and coordinated with different teams to insure our needs to be met!! Santosh, sayeed and khalid were amazing too. The place was amazing and the activities were very nice. The privacy however is lacking specially to Muslims who want to swim with their wife’s wearing bikini in their private pool which they cannot since the private pool is not very private. The transportation was nice however you dont feel free to roam and have to wait for a pick up to come, it’s understandable that it is for the safety of both animals and customers, however, a small scooter or a bike would be harmless and more enjoyable. And the ferry seemed very cheap and crowded which was not comfortable. Prices were a rip off in general.

Eric

The area and number of animals on this island exceeded my expectations. The hotel is also very luxurious, and the taste of Italian and African restaurants has exceeded my expectations as well. The restaurant service is also very good, and I would like to give special praise to Samra. Anyway, this was a very satisfying trip

Fatima Alkhoori

This is my second time to this resort because of its amazing location - However, I have two comments that made us very disappointed this time. The boat that took us to the island was without AC and it was very old and smelly and it created severe discomfort and during summer times this should not be acceptable at all. Also, the quality and taste of food is very very very very bad.. We tried the italian restaurant olio and the room service dining and the african restuarant and all were tasteless. The staff are very friendly though and the service is usually very quick. I hope that you pay attention to the boat and food quality. I tried filling out this survey in the link shared by the resort instead of posting it here but it shows that the link is expired although we’ve checked out just now today. So I had to post here. Thanks!

Juna A.

We traveled hours from Dubai to reach the Dhanna Port and it was totally worth it. This island is a fairytale! Unforgettable experience. 12/10, I'd say ;) The Anantara Sir Bani Yas team is truly special and very accommodating, one of the main reasons why we like to stay at Anantara hotels. Upon reaching the island, we already saw some animals roaming around the area - what a nice way to welcome guests :) A shout out to our host Wala & Thilina who were top drawer, Emmanuel from Concierge who I spoke to at length, the bubbly and energetic lady at the Italian restaurant and Michelle and Affef at the Port. We really felt the warmth of the staff here!!! We stayed for my husband's birthday and the place was absolutely fantastic, we even got an upgrade to a pool villa. Big thanks to the GHA program - all the little extras such as the cake in the room, welcome amenities and towel arrangements just elevate Anantara above others. Definitely will be back. Big thanks, Juna & Kev (Sahel Villa 77)