Millennium Resort – Mussanah, Oman

Paraphrasing Paul Simon’s lyrics in All Around The World,

“out in the Indian Ocean somewhere, there’s a former Army post…”

Well, “out in the Omani Desert somewhere, there’s a great big Navy post…”
And just down the road from it is the Millennium Resort, arched precisely around a marina carved out of the edge of the desert.

An hour and bit North of Muscat the hotel feels well off the beaten track but the hotel attracts weekender’s down from Dubai and mariners drawn to the marina.
Check-in was confusing and protracted and despite a reservation it didn’t feel like, or sound like, it was going smoothly at all. Without my Omanii agent I’m sure things wouldn’t have gone well or as smoothly as it should for a four star hotel.

Disappointingly facing the car-park, my room was a good size with a large bed, good sized flat-screen TV with several English speaking channels and the thoughtful addition of having internet radio and a bluetooth media hub, nice sized and well equipped bathroom. A large desk by the window with a large business type office chair enabled work to be dealt with comfortably when needed.

Pretty much all you need for a business stay.

Despite my initial disappointment with the view from my balcony, at sundown I was greeted each and every evening to amazing views of the setting sun illuminating the Hajar Mountains in the distance with it’s ever changing colours and an impressively star-lit night skies.

During the working week the hotel was pretty quiet. Spooky quiet. Dining in the restaurant in the evenings it was often just a dozen or so guests and by 9:00PM the restaurant was pretty much empty. Quality of the food was truly outstanding though and every evening was a delight. Service was very good too with the staff being attentive, friendly and very polite.

Hooking up to the free in-room WiFi was problematic though and with the desk being located by the window, the furthest point in the room, the WiFi was often not even detectable. So problematic that I called reception to check it was actually working. Minutes later a Techie arrived to check out the problem and his Samsung mobile picked up the WiFi signal that neither of my two iPhones nor my laptop could detect. Internet was finally hooked up by disconnecting the cable from my VoIP desk phone and plugging it in to my laptop.

Reception staff were helpful up to a point but gave the impression that whatever it was you wanted was all a little too much trouble and you were somewhat putting them out by cluttering up their reception in the first place.

Facilities were limited in the hotel, the gift shop was closed and the nearby convenience store was closed too looking like it only opened when the hotel hosted events like the Laser Dinghy World Championships, but the beach-side pool was positioned nicely and was a delight to use in the afternoon sun.

For me, with no personal transport available, the hotel was too isolated.

PROS: Convenient for visiting the nearby Naval Base. Good restaurant. Nice pool.  Comfortable room.

CONS: Indifferent staff. Poor in-room WiFi. Remote location.

HOTEL WEBSITE: http://www.millenniumhotels.com/millenniumresortmussanah/