Most people don’t need much assistance in jumping for joy in the Maldives. If you do, the Beach House at Manafaru has a ‘bungee trampoline’…
You make appointments with the reception to use it between the hours of 4:00 and 6:00 pm. Weight limited 10kg to 85 kg.
Boing!
The Maldives has always been a bit of an opposite to Hotel California. You could check-in any time you like, but you could never stay.
Not just the tourists, but the resorts themselves are on long-term leases and don’t actually own their islands. But in a bid to boost the economy, the Maldives is cautiously venturing into residential purchases. You can’t actually own the property ‘freehold’, but they are offering ‘leaseholds’ (most Americans won’t be familiar with ‘leaseholds’ but they are a common structure in the UK and other countries. They are essentially an ‘option’ on a long-term, decades, ‘lease’ of the property that you can buy and sell like the property itself and work almost the same as owning the property itself).
The first place to pioneer this new opportunity is Soneva Fushi reports Phuquet Insider…
A complete property spec on the six five residences for sale are featured on Ilre.
Plenty of great surf spots in the Maldives (even more if you do kite surfing), and a number of resorts offer surfing equipment and instruction, but there is only one ‘Surf Shack’ around – Four Seasons Kuda Huraa’s TropicSurf.
The Surf Shack sells a whole range of surf gear. It also provides video analysis as part of its instruction offerings. But it really just has a whole surfing vibe to it.
A great example of its surfing vibe and great offerings is its recently announced its ‘Champion Trophy Package’. Maldives.Net reports…
“The Maldives is set to host the world’s most exclusive surfing event this August. The event organized by Four Seasons Resorts Maldives, will feature six world champions, a leading five-star surfing resort, a luxurious 39-metre three-deck catamaran, and the perfect reef break waves. Conceived in conjunction with luxury surf pioneers Tropicsurf, the Four Seasons Resorts Maldives Surfing Champions Trophy will see the sport’s biggest legends such as four-time world champion Mark Richards compete across three disciplines that showcase the evolution of modern surfing.”
So if you are a hang-ten pro or a even bit clueless on the surfing front (like this lot), then head over to the Surf Shack.
Maldives may not be a ‘Test Status’ cricket nation, but they love their wickets as much as their Subcontinent neighbours. Their closest Indian Ocean neighbour Sri Lanka is right in the middle of a Test Match with England at this very moment.
If you fancy a few overs, either watching or playing, then Kuramthi is the pitch you want. Their staff have an active team that competes across the country and they welcome resort guests to join in or simply sip their G&T’s from the side.
Asma Rasheed of the resort describes…
The pictures here are just a few taken from Kuramathi’s Facebook album of one of their recent tournaments.
In the spirit of World Oceans Day, the Maldives established a record number of protected marine areas last week in what many consider to be the most spectacular atoll in the Maldives, Baa. The map above links through to the UNESCO map of the areas.
The first 5 areas are in a string right across the centre of the atoll, and at the eastern edge is Coco Palm Dhuni Kolhu. In fact, Dhuni Kolhu is right next to Hanifaru Reef, the closest any resort is to a protected area.
Happy World Oceans Day!
The entire country of the Maldives is celebrating this event including several special activities in various resorts. But the resort that has pulled out the stops is Kuramathi. They are featuring a special complementary dive, an underwater photography competition, and reef clean up. The event is being sponsored by the resort’s recently inaugurated Eco Center as a part of its overall green strategy.
This award could also be called the ‘Driest of the Wettest’. That is, the driest place to be (south) during the wettest period of the year (June).
June is the wettest month of the year with an average of 12 inches of rain. Not to fret too much. I’ve travelled to Maldives in June on several occasions and never once saw a cloud. Same old dazzling sunshine. I kept dreading to pull back the curtain in the morning and see the climate of Macclesfield in January only to be blinded by the sunlight. The other counterbalancing statistic is that the ‘Hours of Sunshine’ is pretty much uniform across most months.
But if you are playing the odds, then June will indeed bring greater likelihood of a dampening to your day. And if you really want to try to outsmart the weather gods, then the south is drier in June. However, the south is wetter in May (so if you were going on 30 May / 1 June, then I don’t know how you would make the call).
‘Goffy’ highlighted this thinking in his Trip Advisor Forum post of targeting regions of the Maldives to try to get the slight edge on even more sunshine. But the big resource is ‘Mariaeugene’s post to TA where she analysed the differences quite thoroughly (see above).
Still, if you want to be as south as possible for whatever reason, then Shangri-La Villingili is your place at 0.041 degrees below the Equator (one of the few Maldives resorts in the Southern Hemisphere).
In honour of Italy’s National ‘Republic Day’ holiday today, I pay tribute to the finest execution of one of my favourite Italian treats – Gazpacho.
Probably because it is a refreshing cold soup, it is served at every resort that I have been to. I happen to be a soup lover and gazpacho is right up their at the top of my list of favourite styles. I shy away from awarding ‘Best Of’ distinctions on food because (a) there is so much fine cuisine in the Maldives now that it seems unfair to do so without sampling everything, and (b) a supremely well done dish is hard to distinguish from another supremely well done dish.
I break the protocol through for Sheraton Full Moon’s ‘Trio of Gazpacho’ at its Sand Coast restaurant. Most of all, it is not just one gazpacho, but three gazpacho treats. The first is a delightful traditional recipe. The second is made from green tomatoes (after years of visiting the American South it is encouraging to learn that there is something you can do with green tomatoes besides fry them…the South’s answer to everything culinary). The third was an almond base with grapes and apples.
It wasn’t just the stand out execution that struck me. The whole ‘gazpacho experience’ was excellent. Sand Coast is set in a grove of coconut trees on the sand by the water. This set up is certainly not unique in the Maldives (we ate almost everyone of our Coco Palm Dhuni Kolu meals in a restaurant they had like this), but we are always surprised how hard it is to get toes-in-the-sand-water’s-edge eating in the Maldives. The restaurant played soothing ambient music with a local twist. And the price was very reasonable and less than what you would pay for a similar dish in a London establishment (it also spoils the appetite a bit looking at stupid prices in menus especially at the higher end resorts).
Kudos to Chef Garth Welsh (see below) who has really set up an operation of lots of gustatory delights at Sheraton Full Moon.
Chef Garth Welsh
Happy International Children’s Day!
An increasingly number of resorts are seeing the appeal to Maldives for families and catering to the younger clientele with some of the distinctive facilities and service that have spoiled the adults for years. One of the first orders of business is a ‘Kids Club’. These clubs not only provide great fun for the children, but also some extra freedom for the parents. But most of these clubs really cater for the ‘tot’ group with lots of colouring books, toys and crafts. But what about that often neglected (or at least feeling neglected) group…Teenagers.
Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru is the first resort to open a club specifically designed for ‘young adults. It’s called ‘Majaa Maizaan’. It includes more big kid pastimes like pool, ping-pong and Playstation.
Whatever.
‘Luxury’ and ‘All Inclusive’ don’t typically go hand in hand.
All Inclusive resorts have tended towards the budget end of the market where people wanted to have a very defined price for their holiday without risk of overspend. Also, budget conscious travellers value the ‘quantity’ (all you can eat) versus ‘quality’. The problem with having ‘All In’ for premium travellers is that when they want extra wine, it could be £100 per bottle wine. An evenings drinking session could consume more than the cost of the holiday. If you start excluding all the treatments, yacht trips, Blue Label scotches and lobster dinners, then the high end traveller wonders what the point is.
But if you want your cake and eat it too in wanting a 5 star resort with an All In plan, then the Lily Beach is the place to go. Trip Advisor Forum reports and reviews consistently rate it as the highest quality all inclusive resort.
They offer a special ‘Platinum Plan’ which they describe as…
“Keeping the overall concept of ‘Affordable Luxury’ in mind, ‘Platinum Plan’ is a Premium All-Inclusive Plan, offering the discerning traveler absolute value-for-money and a hassle-free holiday with uninhibited enjoyment and peace of mind. Our ‘Platinum Plan’ will delight you with a fantastic array of quality services including premium wines & spirits, sumptuous dining experiences, hand-crafted excursions, sport activities, and much, much more!”
Lily Beach is the place were high rollers can go ‘all in’.