Yadis Camp Ksar Ghilane

This romantic tented camp at the oasis of Ksar Ghilane offers the ultimate in desert luxury

Built on the site of an old ksar (Berber castle) and surrounded by shady date palms, this is a unique opportunity for a romantic and luxurious stopover deep in the Sahara desert. Although it calls itself a camp, it’s really a hotel with tents instead of rooms - and a very stylish hotel at that. There's a smart restaurant serving French and Bedouin cuisine, a cool bar for chilling out, various boutiques selling local crafts, all built in Berber style around a central courtyard. And the height of indulgence: a gorgeous swimming pool fed by a natural spring, softening the arid desert landscape like a jade oasis.

From the restored watchtower there are magnificent views over the Great Eastern Erg: ripples of apricot sand stretching to the horizon like waves on a vast ocean. Explore them by camel or 4x4, and you will find billowing dunes, eerie salt pans and crumbling Roman forts - an other-worldly landscape which you might recognise from early Star Wars movies or The English Patient.

Highs

• Fabulous location at the northern tip of the Sahara, surrounded by an oasis of date palms and tamarisk trees
• That feeling - rare nowadays - of 'frontier' travel: the stuff of pioneering adventurers
• The romance of a desert sunset, watching the dunes turn gently lilac
• Comfortable tented rooms with air-con and hot showers
• Authentic Bedouin cuisine in traditional goat hair tents
• A lovely pool to cool off in during the heat of the day, or to wash off the dust after a day on the dunes

Lows

• A change of ownership in early 2011 (it was formerly run by Pansea) means we can't vouch for service
• It's rather decadent: not for those wanting an authentic desert camping experience
• It’s an awful long way from anywhere else, and you need a 4x4 with a driver who knows the desert pistes (best arranged through the hotel). This also means it's not cheap, as everything has to be jeeped in
• Touts hang around outside the camp offering camel and horse rides - which is great if you want one, but a nuisance if not
• The camp will be closed from mid-June until early-September 2012 for renovations