Best of Maldives Online – Facebook Input: Kuredu

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Kuredu Facebook

It’s all about the conversation.

That’s the conventional wisdom on social media. It’s all very well and good to put up your blog, Facebook page/group, and Twitter feed, but if no one engages, then you’ve sort of missed the point. The real acid test for successful social media is the ‘social’ bit. To what degree do people get involved with what you have to say? In blogs, it’s commenting and trackbacking. With Twitter, it’s Retweets and Replies. On Facebook, it’s wall posts and comments.

As such, when I was reviewing all of the Maldives resort Facebook pages, I decided to make note of the amount of non-resort comments and posts the page/group got. As I noted in my original post, the Maldives resorts average about one comment/post per day. But, the variation within that average is immense from some who get hardly anything to those like Kuredu who are a non-stop buzz.

Actually, for the period that I tallied (the month of January), Kuredu was the one resort where I simply had trouble counting all of the comments and posts, but I estimate that they we over 1,000! The next closest was Meeru with 213.

It wasn’t just the Wall activity either. As noted in yesterday’s post in Photos, Kuredu had held the runner up position for album contributions with 2,629 snaps. All of this online social activity is possibly an extension of their very strong ‘Forum’.

And not a single cat video nor motivational poster to be seen.

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Best of Maldives Online – Facebook Photos: Meeru

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Meeru Facebook Photos

A picture is worth a thousand words, and a good Facebook album can give you an insight out perspective of the resort.

After ‘Likes’, the next easiest measure to check out on a resort’s Facebook page is the number of Photos that Friends have posted. On this score, the Flickr of the Maldives is Meeru with 2,984 (as of the end of January). Today it is up to 3,030.

The next closest was Champa sister resort Kuredu with 2,629 (does Champa hand out cameras at reception or are they particularlt photogenic?).

Say cheese platter!

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Best of Maldives Online – Facebook Likes/Members: Kuramathi

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Kuramathi Facebook

Everyone wants to be Liked.

The most prominent bragging rights to any Facebook presence is ‘Likes’ (or ‘Members’ if you are set up as a ‘Group’). While this measure is debatable, it is transparent and certainly indicative of a degree of engagement and popularity.

The runaway winner for Maldives resorts is Kuramathi with 7,347 ‘Likes’.

Frankly, this is the page that kicked off my investigation into the use of Facebook by various resorts. When I went to the Kuramathi page I was struck by the richness of activity and contributions by both the resort and guests. I had visited plenty of resort Facebook pages, but Kuramathi’s made me wonder if any other resorts had stepped up to this level. I figured that I couldn’t dish out a ‘Best of Maldives’ without a more thorough examination. I really had to look at all of the resorts’ Facebook Pages (or in some case Groups). When I first made note of this idea for a post, Kuramathi had over 4,000 Likes, when I did my survey in January they had 7,347 and as of yesterday (see snap above) they stood at 7,786. In just a month, they have grown over 500 which is half the amount of the average total number of ‘Likes’ by resorts. In fact, their growth in a single month of 500 is more than total Likes/Members of 47 resorts.

I ‘Like’.

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Best of the Maldives: Craft Activities – Kurumba

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Kurumba crafts

Happy Centenary to the Girl Scouts.

Our family has a proud tradition in the scouts with my father an Eagle Scout and my grandfather a ‘Silver Beaver’ recipient. A good scouting career often starts with a range of creative activities and skils building. Often, with the spirit of scouting, many of the crafts and skills use materials and tools found in nature.

Kurumba’s new Majaa Kids’ Club and Majaa Recreation Centre would do the Scouts proud with their ‘coconut arts and crafts’. An extensive range of weaving, folding and other crafting of palm fronds are taught to kids of all ages including many equally enthralled mature students (see below).

Majaa Recreation Manager Monica Comanescu noted…

“The Dhivehi word, Majaa, means fun. This will be the underlying philosophy for the Recreation department. Majaa Recreation will be the ‘fun’ centre of the island. This allows it to be a unique identity and destination within Kurumba. The purpose of Majaa Recreation is to provide guests with many options to enjoy their holiday while experiencing the Maldivian palette and learning about the water that surround Kurumba in an environmentally responsible way with a Maldivian twist.”

Majaa Recreation offers more than just crafts with such a range of activities, Kurumba grouped them into categories…

  • Kan’du (Ocean) – Ocean based activities
  • Hakatha (Energy) Energy or sporting activities
  • Kulhivaru (Games) Games
  • Visnun (Learning) Understanding and learning activities
  • Haveeru (Evening) Evening activities.

Some people like to sit around and do absolutely as little as possible on a Maldivian holiday, but Kurumba provides an alternative for those who want the option for broader range of fun.

Kurumba Majaa

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Best of the Maldives: Breakfast Juice – Soneva Gili

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Soneva Gili breakfast juices

 

This is photo of Soneva Gili by Six Senses is courtesy of TripAdvisor.

If you prefer your revitalising fluids inside you rather than around you, then you might want to start you day off at Soneva Gili. I was first alerted to Soneva Gili’s exceptional juice array by Sakis in a Trip Advisor Forum post where he noted proposed Gili as one of the best breakfast buffets in the Maldives: “One of the best is Soneva Gili for breakfast buffet, the choice among 60 fresh juices makes it also unique.” Few people have seen more Maldive resorts than Sakis so it’s a pretty compelling endorsement to me.

Their juice menu is full of healthy and tasty concoctions like…

  • “Ocean Basic” – Apple and Carrots
  • “Morning Berry” – Raspberry, Apple, Orange, Spirulina
  • “Bloody Carrot” – Carrot, Beetroot, Celery, Lime).
  • “Green ‘n Pear It” – Broccoli, Celery, Pear (great name for anything with broccoli in it).

As you can see, their offerings include veggie juices as well as fruit. Each item on the menu also has a complete nutritional breakdown as well as notations on benefits to Energy, Detox, Immunity, Degestion and Skin.

 

Soneva Gili juices

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Best of the Maldives: Lagoon Breakfast – Mirihi

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Mirihi lagoon breakfast

If the lure of the Maldives is the pervasive surroundings of water, then after your morning bath or shower similarly encircled. If you want to have breakfast in the water rather than on the water, then you can enjoy your breakfast completely immersed at Mirihi. They offer a ‘Feet in the Water Breakfast’ for $68 per person which covers whatever the guest wants (not the ‘caviar’, but normal breakfast fare). Assistant Front Office Manager Bastian Singer describes…

“As you can see the table is directly set up at the shoreline and the guests really have the feet in the water during the breakfast. It’s mostly used for special occasions like birthdays or wedding anniversaries as there is as well a bottle of champagne included.”

We love the beach dining concept. From the beginning of our family’s trips to the Maldives, we loved to eat right out on the sand by the ocean’s edge. In the go old days, years ago, the resorts were pretty laid back and were happy to move a table out to the beach for you. Now, many of the resorts are even more happy and set up to do so, but they usually bill it as a special meal or service. I don’t begrudge the resorts for doing so. It is both a bit more of a kuffufle that would impede their operations if everyone did it every day. And it is definitely extra value. Now Mirihi takes beach dining a step forward from water’s edge to water itself.

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Best of the Maldives: Shower – Naladhu

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Naladhu shower

Given their prominent in escalating arms race of luxury at Maldives resorts perhaps ‘bathrooms’ should be called ‘showerrooms’. In the beginning there was the en suite shower. Standard and effective. Then, a resort got a bit adventurous and decided to locate the shower outdoors so one could go au naturel al fresco (to mix my languages a bit there). Then, more recently, a simple shower head was not sumptuous enough and ‘drench showers’ became de rigueur for the super premium properties. Now, actually, drench showers are yesterday’s fashion and the latest are waterfall showers for the leading edge.

Several of the top resorts splash out for the waterfall showers, but none quite so extravagantly as Naladhu. They have placed their marble (again, pretty standard for super-luxe class) shower in the middle of its own reflecting pool.

A little showering island on your island of paradise.

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Best of the Maldives: Indoor Bathroom – Adaaran Vadoo

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Vadoo bathroom

 

 

As I’ve added a whole category for ‘Bathroom’ Best-Ofs, seems appropriate to call out Adaaran Vadoo which from my research is simply one of the best Indoor Bathrooms in the Maldives.

Indoor, at least.  I limit it to ‘Indoor’, because ‘Outdoor’ ones are so popular and distinctive that they have a whole different set of possibilities and considerations. That said, the Vadoo bathroom does open up to an outdoor area as well.

The luxury bathroom includes the always eye-catching glass floor (see pictures). Most water villas who have these feature them in the main room which makes sense providing a prominent visual feature in the most prominent part of the villa. Actually, a number of water villas do have small glass portals in the bathrooms…but by the toilet. When I first saw this at Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru, I thought that it would be a unique feature, but on investigation, I have found several toilets so equipped (sure beats a newspaper). Vadoo is the only villa I know of that has a prominent glass floor (8 feet by 2 feet) in the main area of the bathroom.

The bathroom includes the obligatory drench shower and the not so standard Jacuzzi. More distinctively, it has a television you can watch from the Jacuzzi. Now normally, I don’t see much need for a TV in the Maldives. Part of the ‘get away from it all’ charm is to avoid turning on the TV or even having one around. But when it comes to the Jacuzzi, it’s actually a nice complement. It can get a little boring just sitting in the Jacuzzi for an age. You can’t really bring magazines or books or iPads into the tub with you especially as the bubbling means lots of little splashes which get all over any reading material you try to bring.

One of the most curious aspects to the Vadoo bathroom is that it doesn’t feel like a ‘bathroom’. It is one of the larger ones I have seen even in the Maldives super-luxe resorts. The TV I mentioned contributes to the feel, but also there is a sizeable comfy sofa! The whole ensemble makes it seem more like a mini-personal spa than a bathroom. A place where you enjoy hanging out, not just visiting for necessary hygiene and primping.

 

Vadoo bathroom 2

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Spa, Pools, Bathrooms and Bedrooms

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Best Of Activity and Infrastructure

The ‘Best’ keeps getting better. And I’ve had to revamp the ‘Best Of’ page a bit more to accommodate all of the accumulating resort highlights. For starters, I have split the page into two tabbed pages since there are simply so many ‘Best Ofs’ to list. I have broken the groups in ‘Activity’ and ‘Infrastructure’.

While I was making those changes and updating the page, I added a few other breakout tags. I’ve split out the following…

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