Maldives first timers

malid

We are looking for a relaxing sunshine filled holiday just for me and my hubby (young 50 somethings!). Maldives is on our radar but we are looking for advice. e.g.

• should we go for 1 week or 2 (we could do 2)
• we want idyllic beaches and sunshine, nice food, drink
• budget - need guidance here. We want a good deal but don't want to go for bare minimum just to get cheapest price
• I have read that booking sea plane transfer is best done when you're there - true or false
• is is necessary and/or better to upgrade when thre (e.g. to a sea bungalow?)
• when is the best time - we can go anytime between Feb and June. Would prefer not to go in absolute peak season
• Advice on travel agent

Hope you can help! :cool:

reehsetin

we did 2 weeks but one week on one island and one week on another, 1 think 2 weeks on one island would be a bit much!
sea plane - personally I was so happy we booked it in advance, the flight was so long I was happy just to get on and go
we went in April and it was PERFECT
We booked through Shiv Travel, they have a website, and they were really good

freebiequennie

We have just come back from our dream holiday from maldives and stayed at diva maldives.

we had the same 1wk or 2wk debate and went for 9 nights (was 10nights with overnight flight on way out).

Initially we had budgeted £2-£3k for both of us for an all inc holiday but realisitically was nearer £5k and around £4k is a sensible budget for a 4-5 star island FB or AI.

I can highly recommend destionology by far gave us the best quotes and excellent service

Lisa Gorton
Personal Gold Travel Consultant

Lisa Gorton
Personal Gold Travel Consultant

Direct Freephone: 0800 634 2834
Email: lisa.gorton@destinology.co.uk
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D[EMAIL="lisa.gorton@Website"][/email]Website: www.destinology.co.uk

budgetflyer

We went to Meeru for a week. I could easily have stayed for 2.
Realistic budget for 2 wks would be £4 to £5K total, AI. They offer a FREE 3 day AI cruise which breaks up the 2 weeks if you want.
We did Emirates flights, speadboat transfer (its not really that far from Male) + it was all packaged up with http://www.key2holidays.co.uk/maldives/ to my EXACT requirements.
The official Meeru Website is http://www.meeru.com/
Some unofficial ones are
http://www.meeru.co.uk/
http://www.meeru.info/
and the brilliant
http://www.meeruisland.co.uk/

malid

Thanks for all the responses so far. Keep them coming all you Maldives experts! Really appreciate comments

Incapuppy

You may wish to check out the Maldives forum on Trip Advisor

http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowForum-g293953-i7445-Maldives.html

PennyPinchingMiser

I went to the Maldives for a week in April 2004, Full board, not inclusive. I went to go scuba diving for the week though, so I didn't drink much alcohol. The drink was expensive, but as the upgrade to inclusive was far more than I spent on alcohol

Food was curry, fish curry, you'll notice a slight lack of cows and sheep on the islands

The island I was on, you could walk around the outside of it in 20mins at a slow pace.


The room was a bungalow, where the back went straight out onto the beach, but with a step. This stopped the crabs climbing into the room at night, which was when they came out.

There were geckos running up and down the walls in the room, and a resident fruit bat in one of the palm trees

Having been once, I wouldn't go back. I didn't find enough to do, especially in the evenings. I do like to go out and find somewhere to eat each night, but that's a bit limiting on a small atoll.

HTH

inspiremetosave

We went to Meeru on our honeymoon last New Year.

We had booked the Sea Plane transfers with the holiday - advise you check your departure times before booking Sea Plane - our flight from Male was at midnight but we were shipped out on the sea plane at 4pm as this was the latest one of the day - and had to wait at the airport for 7hours.... if we had known this would happen we would have had the boat transfer.

We went on the hope of being able to upgrade on arrival, it was fully booked the whole time so we could not.

We went all inclusive and glad we did so as the price of drinks were high (you can understand as everything has to be imported)

It is very much a relaxing holiday, if you get bored easily this may not be the holiday for you.

I would recommend that you take a pair of coral shoes (sports soccer or ebay) as the coral was damaged in the tsunami a couple of years ago - it is still beautiful!

Take your own snorkel and mask if you can - we used ours everyday. You can hire there put would be cheaper to have your own.

We stayed in the basic accomodation, and it is just that! Perfectly adequate but not very pretty!

inspire x

davidlizard

We did a week in Sri Lanka followed by a week in the Maldives (its about 1 hour flight from Colombo) - this gave us a week sightseeing/riding on elephants etc, followed by a week lazing around - a good balance.

Recommend as others have hinted at in going AI - most islands have just the one resort, so they can charge what they fancy - at one island we went to lunch was $20 and evening meals were $50, with beer $5, cocktails $10-$20, and even bottled water was $3. If you do go AI, a load of $1 bills for tips are always appreciated.

If you want to do scuba diving, there are limits to how long before/after flying you can do this. Also recommend get the basics done at home to maximise time spent when there. However, you can see plenty of marine life with snorkel/flippers - and wear a t-shirt so not to get sunburnt.

It is also worth finding out who else uses the island - one we went to was 80% italian - now italians are lovely friendly people but do they make a noise on the beach - non stop yelling all day long which made the holiday less than relaxing.

littledot_2

My OH and I stayed on Kuredu Island 03-04 Xmas and New Year and it cost us £3k. We thought that was a lot of money but now it seems like a right bargain! The prices have shot up since then. Xmas and NY are peak times but it now costs more than that to stay at other times of the year. I would always recommend AI but you must check what each island provides as they all vary. Dont assume that all snacks inbetween meals are provided, many are not.

It may take a little working out to find your best deal and resort. Kuredu was nice for us, however we found two weeks more than enough. Ten days would have been just right. Kuredu has all the usual water activities, a very nice pool, volleyball, football pitch and even a small golf course. The diving is superb.

I booked our seaplane transfer by emailing the resort and they booked if for us and it worked out cheaper. However, be warned, Male airport is organised chaos and the tannoy system was very difficult to understand while trying to listen out for our transfer flight. I booked the flight to avoid a 6-hr speedboat ride but still arrived later that the boat because of the airport chaos! BUT the views of the islands as the sun was setting is a memory I will never forget.

I agree that you will probably need to spend 5-6k on 2 week trip now.