Best of the Maldives: Welcome Drink Sculpture – Sun Siyam Vilu Reef

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Vilu Reef - frog fish 4

The Maldivian “welcome drink” is one of the first rituals which make you feel that you have arrived at a distinctive paradise and an exotic tropical experience awaits you. Typically, the refreshment is some tropical fruit juice or a freshly hacked coconut’s contents. Sometimes the drink is a bit more elaborate…but none so extravagantly so as Sun Siyam Vilu Reef ‘s frog fish passion fruit sculpture (see photo). We’ve seen all sort of melon sculptures, but never a passion fruit. And all sorts of concocted creatures, but never a frog fish (whose likeness was quite impressive).

Sun Siyam Vilu Reef - greeting drink

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Best of the Maldives: Bubble Tea – Amingiri

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Aminigiri - bubble tea

You can’t turn a corner in London without seeing a bubble tea outlet, and yet this Taiwanese drink craze has yet to hit the Maldives. There are a few establishments in downtown Male, but only Amingiri offers it (“a modern take on bubble tea” no less) at its Sip Tea Lounge. Bubble tea (also known as pearl milk tea, bubble milk tea, tapioca milk tea, boba tea, or boba) most commonly consists of tea accompanied by chewy tapioca balls (“boba” or “pearls”), but it can be made with other toppings as well, such as grass jelly, aloe vera, red bean, and popping boba. It has many varieties and flavors, but the two most popular varieties are pearl black milk tea and pearl green milk tea.

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Best of the Maldives: Tepache – Amilla

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Amilla - tepache 2

Tropical fruit is a classic ingredient to any Maldives visit – papaya, mango, pineapple. The creative F&B folks use these in a variety of food and beverage treats. Pineapple is of course one of the staples of our favourite Maldives treat – the Puerto Rican pina colada. Amilla Maldives offers another Latin American pineapple beverage – tepache – homemade on the island. Tepache is a fermented Mexican beverage made from the peel and the rind of pineapples and sweetened either with piloncillo or brown sugar. The process takes up to 9 months and uses every part of the pineapple. Tepache can be enjoyed on its own (see above) or in a cocktail like their Thai Lime cocktail made from Ginger-Infused Vodka, Lime, Lemongrass Chili Bitters, Tepache.

Amilla - tepache

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Best of the Maldives: “Bucket” List – Soneva Jani

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Soneva Jani - bucket sink

The Maldives is one of those ever-present bucket-list destinations, and it turns out that Soneva Jani literally puts the ‘bucket’ into this ‘bucket list’ paradise. First of all, their main restaurant is outfitted with a quirky sink made from a bucket (and I always appreciate an inventive wash basin). But also, their crab shack outlet featured two distinctive beverage “buckets”. While we all know about the commonplace, “wine bucket” to keep your bottle cold by your table, Soneva Jani had a “beer bucket” for your bottle of beer. They also had a special “wine glass bucket” which kept your glass of wine chilled during your meal. All great fun and very practical as well.

Soneva Jani - beer bucket

Soneva Jani - drink bucket

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Best of the Maldives: Fountain Sink – Dhawa Iruhu

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I love a creative sink and this one at Dhawa Ihuru strikes a particularlty personal chord. When we remodelled our home, I designed a “fountain sink” where water from the faucet flowed onto a flat marble slab which then cascaded into a basin on the floor creating a waterfall effect. Such designs are particularly apropos in the water wonderland that is the Maldives. Ihuru’s version takes flowing water concept to the next level with a little rivulet of water trickling into the basin.

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Best of the Maldives: Water Breakfasts – Sun Siyam Vilu Reef

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The aquatic wonderland of the Maldives is all about the water. And Sun Siyam Vilu Reef have made the water a venue for a comprehensive range of distinctive dining experiences:

  • Pool Breakfast
  • Lagoon Breakfast
  • Sand Spit Breakfast

We’ve always loved eating our breakfasts by the water, and we have eaten them in the water with the increasingly grammable pool breakfasts, but we have never experienced so many and such diverse water-centric morning feasts.

I’ve added a new Tag for “in water” offerings and activities for things you normally wouldn’t do in water, but Maldives resorts have found a way to add an aquatic twist.

  

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Best of the Maldives: Pool Hoist – Amilla

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Amilla - pool hoist

IWOOT! (I want one of those) I coach rowing for disabled individuals and one of the challenges is transfers from wheelchairs to the boats the water. We often improvise with manual lifting, but as Lori points out (who used to run a therapy department for disability treatment centre), manual assists for transfers can be dangerous not only for the helper, but for the individual being helped. The proper way to transfer to someplace like the water is with a purpose-built hoist. Also, hoists allow the impaired individual to transfer more gracefully and not feel self-conscious about bothering people to assist them. Thankfully, Amilla Maldives has introduced one to the Maldives:

  • “We have a beach wheelchair to assist with moving on loose sand. For access to the water, we have a floating wheelchair. We also have a portable pool hoist which can be used in the main pool and in the Reef Pool Water Villa. The Two Bedroom Beach Pool Villa’s pool is at a small height, so alternative access through a sling can be arranged.”

Amilla - pool hoist 2

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How Much is a Pool in the Maldives?

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Maldives pool

One of the very first motivations to start Maldives Complete was to get a comprehensive list of resorts with pools (which our kids loved to frolic in). Now the pervasive 5-star luxury properties nearly all have pools with every room. But, they come at a price. That is, a price uplift versus equivalent rooms without the pools. Similar to my previous, “How Much Does a Sunset Cost?”, I thought I would tap into Maldives Complete’s database of over 1200 room categories to analyse this pool premium.

I compared all room types where the resort had definitively matching room descriptors of a room type with and without a pool (eg. “Beach Villa” and “Beach Villa with Pool”):

Disclaimer: Not all pools the same. Also, a number of “with Pool” room categories have larger room footprints so the room type is really more than just an added pool, but rather the pool is the signature addition that also signifies and includes other enhancements.

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Once a Journalist

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Togo journalist

  • “Once a priest, always a priest; once a mason, always a mason; but once a journalist, always and forever a journalist.” – Rudyard Kipling

Journalism Day today which reminded me of the earliest roots to Maldives Complete…my lifelong avocation in journalistic writing. I embarked on a life of “journalism” in elementary school penning a weekly newsletter for the youth programme at church called “Juice Man”. I then started and edited my high school’s first page in the local paper (the “Ramblin’ Clam” in the Ipswich Chronicle). My first “professional” journalism gig was as an overseas correspondent focusing on travel writing about the West African country of Togo. The Maldives Complete’s interactive database stems from my similarly long technology, but the now 2400+ article blog stems from this life of reporting intriguing stories about intriguing places.

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Best of the Maldives: Largest Floating Solar Array – Taj Exotica

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Taj Exotica - solar array

The best places in the world for solar are power are those with (a) lots of sunshine, and (b) significant expanses of space to collect those sun rays. While the “Sunny Side of Life” has plenty of the former, this island archipelago has notoriously little of the latter. On land that is. But Taj Exotica has taken advantage of the destination’s largest resource – the ocean – in order to reduce carbon footprint to help save that self-same ocean.

  • “The SolarSea system, coupled with a battery storage solution, allows the resort to run entirely on renewable energy during daylight hours. This eco-friendly approach translates to a reduction of approximately 475,000 liters of diesel consumption annually, along with a decrease of 1,200 tons in carbon footprint.”
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