Doha’s gorgeous Four Seasons luxury hotel

The gal has enthused before about the unending value of getting everything right at luxury hotels, and increasingly this comes down to anticipation. At the most agreeable Four Seasons Hotel Doha one of the managers recounted how a dishwasher at the final, fifth, hiring interview, was thanked for choosing the hotel – think how valued that new employee felt. This 232-room hotel, by the way, has about 630 team members, from 35 countries, none of them Qatari. (Is it true that a local, working as an immigration officer, say, makes more money than a hotel GM? If so, no wonder no Doha girls or boys, want to work in hospitality, even Four Seasons, when they grow up?).

The hotel’s grounds were sculptured and designed for years before the complex, complete with authentic-look mediaeval towers,, opened in 2004. There is also a separate wellness complex that has 11 treatment rooms – try a Biologique Recherché facial – and an excellent Technogym, with sudoku on a couple of the runners. The busy programme of classes, some complimentary, offers a selection of yogas, and there is good hydrotherapy. Showing what a great hotel this is, by the way, a night manager opened up the gym for me at four, way before sunrise and my early flight.

The flying saucer-like Nobu sits at the end of a promontory – see the sunrise photo above. Since my last visit, however, the all-day restaurant in the main building has been re-imagined. Elements now has foods, and chefs, from Arabia, China, Japan and Thailand. One of us started with dim sum, another with soft-shelled crab, another with sashimi, and I went on to a local mixed grill, with kofta and kibbeh and kebab, served on a small grill with hot charcoals underneath. Our wine was a superb Australian, Brown Brothers Tempranilla 2015

And then I went back upstairs to lovely end suite 1206 (see the video below), used Italian toiletries, Acqua di Parma, and slept like a log. After my nocturnal workout, pre-ordered breakfast arrived exactly as requested, complete with French Beurre d’Isigny butter and English Tiptree preserves. Nothing but the best for this luxury hotel, I thought yet again. There, downstairs in the lobby among an army of night-time cleaners and polishers stood my Argentinian friend, the Hotel Manager, Andrea Obertello. Considering it was all of one minute past six, how about THAT for dedication? The BMW-7 was waiting, iPad and WiFi at the ready. My name is Roderick, said the Indian driver. Are you ready, madam? AND NOW SEE SUITE 1206