Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru adds another creature to the school of flying fish is the Maldives skies introducing its boxfish styled seaplane (to join the whale shark, yellowfin tuna, shark, and parrot fish).
Best of the Maldives: Yellowfin Tuna Seaplane – FlyMe
The latest surf-faring air transfer in the Maldives with a distinctly piscatorial picture scheme is FlyMe’s “yellow tuna” inspired seaplane…
- FlyMe is bringing four Twin Otter 300 series planes and plan to begin their operations by October. The colourful and newly designed Flyme’s seaplane livery is inspired by the yellowfin tuna, the most widely-caught, and possible the most well-known, tuna species in the Maldives.”
The flying fish in the Maldives are the biggest in the world…
Best of the Maldives: Shark Plane – Hulhumale
The biggest flying sea creature is the Embraer plane visit last month to the Maldives. Maldives Isle website reported…
- “Embraer’s E190-E2 Profit Hunter demonstration airplane, with its distinctive shark livery, completed a demo flight at Velana International Airport this afternoon. Potential buyers and prominent airline officials from Maldivian, Flyme and Manta Air took part in the 1-hour demo flight.”
Maybe not a permanent fixture, but to fun to omit from the collection of sea creature inspired aviation in the maldives.
Best of the Maldives: Parrot Fish Plane – Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru
Up the sky of the Baa atoll, it’s a fish named after a bird, it’s a plane…it’s Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru’s latest seaplane inspired by one of the more colourful creatures on the atoll reef…
“A warm welcome to the 52nd member of our fleet!!! The magnificent Four Seasons branded aircraft!”
I might have to create a new tag for “Fish Planes”…
Best of the Maldives: Resort Airport – Kooddoo
In many places, being “close to the airport” is seen as a negative. The new Mercure Maldives Kooddoo actually boast its aeronautical geography with its press releases announcing: “Mercure Maldives Kooddoo Resort is the first ever water villa resort built on an airport island in Maldives.”
Kooddoo is an airports like Heathrow with jumbo jets roaring in and rattling the rafters every 30 seconds. Instead it gets one or two flights a day from relatively small planes. The infrequency makes it more of an event than a disturbance (“De plane, de plane!” – Tatoo, Fantasy Island). On the positive side, it makes for an incredibly convenient outside-Kaafu transfer. For most distant resorts, you can either take a seaplane that will land at your resort but many consider very loud inside and too small and cramped for some people’s liking (not to mention expensive). Or you can take small jet planes to an increasing number of mini-airports around the country, but then you still have one more transfer by speedboat to finally get to your resort. At Kooddoo, you have the comfort and cost-savings of a conventional flight and when you touch down, you are just a short buggy ride to your villa.
Best of the Maldives: Aeronautical Heritage: Equator Village
The resort to celebration all things aviation is Equator Village. Not only set in the epicentre of Maldives aeronautics past and present, but itself originally an airbase. The villas themselves used to be officer quarters and the dining room the officer’s club. The classic post-war style is still in evidence and the property features a number of reminders of its high flying pedigree. RAF veterans still make regular pilgrimages for reunions to the resort. I especially enjoyed this nostalgic collection of videos taken of Gan way back before the tourism industry had brought foreign guests by the planeload.
For the full story, check out my previous post about the base’s history (as well as some of the other historical highlights of Gan.
Best of the Maldives: Seaplane – FlyMe
What’s your ride getting dressed up as for Halloween? The prize for best seaplane costume definitely goes to FlyMe’s “SEEPLANE” had its maiden flight this week.
It is appropriately based at the epicentre of everything whale shark in Maldives near the bottom of the South Ari atoll, the Villa International Airport Maamigili. In fact, the whale shark marine sanctuary goes right by the airport.
The amphibian Cessna C208 holds up to 7 passengers (plus 2 pilots). It serves all the resorts in the area for 20 minute (or longer) privately booked and scheduled excursions with a minimum of 4 people.
Seaplanes have always been a distinctive way to experience the unique, other-worldly geography of the Maldives. And if you don’t spy a whale shark swimming below, you can always have a photo-op with this aeronautic imposter.
Pimp my seaplane!
