Day 1 Agadir Morocco - Outbound Travel

Day 1 of our 2026 summer holiday to Agadir in Morocco!

As usual, we started our annual summer holiday a little earlier than the school holidays officially allowed in an attempt to save a few quid. This did mean Holly had to miss her final day of Year 7, while Brandon missed the final day of his two-week work experience placement at Dunton. Still, sacrifices had to be made!

Despite booking our holiday through TUI, our afternoon flight was with Ryanair, departing from Stansted. The outbound journey was as easy and straightforward as we've ever experienced. In fact, everything went so smoothly that I spent most of the journey waiting for something to go wrong! Stansted is also so much more convenient for us than the larger London airports, which certainly helped make the start of the holiday nice and stress-free.

We left home at around 12:30pm and arrived at the Riu Tikida Palace at roughly 9:00–9:30pm, making it around nine hours door-to-door. As I said, everything went incredibly smoothly, right down to passport control and collecting our luggage at Agadir Airport. We must have been in and out of the airport within 30 minutes of landing, which has to be some sort of record!

The transfer to the hotel was only around 35–40 minutes, although by the time we arrived it was already dark, so we didn't get to appreciate much of the surrounding area. One thing that did catch my attention as we approached the resort, though, was a long, straight stretch of road—probably around a mile long—with some fantastic facilities running alongside it. There were football pitches, basketball courts, parks and plenty of shaded areas, and the local kids were everywhere, just hanging out, playing sport and generally having fun.

It was such a refreshing sight and, to me, the complete opposite of what you often see back home in England, where so many kids seem to spend their free time indoors on a games console, phone or watching TV. It was genuinely lovely to see and certainly gave me an early impression that keeping active is just a much bigger part of everyday life here. Maybe that's one of the reasons you don't see anywhere near as many overweight people around!

Anyway, the Riu Tikida Palace certainly delivered the wow factor the moment we walked into the lobby and reception area. It looked absolutely stunning.

The main restaurant closed at 10pm, so the check-in staff kindly advised us to head straight in and grab some dinner while they dealt with our check-in. After filling our faces and refuelling after the journey, we headed back to reception, collected our key cards and made our way up to our adjoining rooms.

As usual, I was sharing with my resident snoring partner, Josh, while Brandon, Holly and Tina took the second room.

Even the corridors leading to our rooms had a real Moroccan feel, from the beautiful tiled floors through to the impressive lighting. And as for the rooms… well, the pictures probably do a better job than I can of showing just how nice they were. They were modern, beautifully decorated, had all the facilities we could need and, best of all, offered a great view from the balcony.

After such a long day of travelling, the boys and I weren't about to waste any time. Once we'd dumped our bags and settled into the room, we headed straight back downstairs to the 24-hour Sports Bar to grab a beer—or two… or three!

And with that, Day 1 was in the bag. It honestly couldn't have got off to a much better start. The journey had been effortless, the hotel looked amazing, the rooms were fantastic and we'd already managed to squeeze in a few drinks before bed.

I just had one thought going through my head as I finally called it a night…

Please let the rest of the holiday be this good!

Despite booking with Tui our flight was with Ryanair.

The ladies ready for their holiday (Holly ready for bed wearing her PJ's).

Boarding on-time is a novelty these days.

As there are 5 of us, Tina was sat next to Holly.

And they were in the row in front of us.

Me, Josh and Brandon sat behind and had paid extra for the emergency exit seats for more leg room.

Brandon spent most of the journey playing his Steam Deck.

Josh was listening to music.

So it was time to let the holiday shenanigan's begin!

Flight was around 3.5 to 4 hours.

And finally we landed in Agadir airport.

Despite being dark on the journey to the hotel I managed to get a picture of these amazing lights on a round-a-bout.

The lobby / reception area of the hotel was absolutely stunning.

Spacious, modern, clean and loads of nice little areas to hang out and chill.

The corridors had a very Moroccan feel to them.

Night time view from our balcony.

Rooms were modern, clean and very spacious.

Josh was impressed with the fact that we had a toilet and a bidet.

Shower room and dual sink bathrooms.

Big comfortable beds - too close for my liking given Joshua's snoring.

Boys will be boys - it is beer o'clock.