Arriving in the Maldives and first few daysJan 7, 2012
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| So - the last leg of our journey!! Boo Hiss. We flex from Phuket to Singapore and then had a few hours in the airport (which is very nice indeed - lots of space and shops and restaurants.) Lizi had a Starbucks. Richard had a Burger King. What a crazy life we lead. Then we flew to Male on a fairly empty flight and were very well looked after by the lovely staff of Singapore Airlines. One highlight - a whole magnum ice cream for dessert!! When we got to Male it was already late (around midnight) and we knew we had to find out what time our seaplane flight was to the resort the next morning. You can imagine at that point how pleased we were to find out that we had to get to the airport on a 5am bus!! So, five hours later and almost no sleep in a boiling hot room we got to the airport and checked in for our flight to our resort which was just before 7. Whilst we were waiting they measured us for flipper sizes. Really the best way to understand the experience that was the sea plane flight is to look at the photos. They don't fly very high so you can see all the beautiful islands and we were lucky enough to be taken directly to our resort (sometimes they have to make several stops). When we were landed we were dropped onto a platform in the middle of the lagoon, far from both the island and our resort (built on stilts over the lagoon). A small boat came and picked us up and we were taken straight to the bar and sat down with a drink. In no time at all we were picked up and taken to our room which was a villa on stilts overlooking the edge of the reef and straight into the sea. It was probably aroud 8am and we were quite tired so we got a couple of hours sleep. I (Richard) was so excited by how amazing it was that I didn't really sleep. As lizi roused, we saw some dolphins swimming and jumping in front of where we were sleeping. We ordered some breakfast into our room and ate it on the top deck overlooking the ocean. What a great start! Over the first few days we took part in activities including a snorkelling lesson, a speedboat trip to see dolphins and our first night's activity which was sunset fishing. We went out as the sun went down and then hand line fished for a couple of hours over the edge of a reef. As the sun went down the fish just kept being pulled in. Lizi was the best of the whole group and caught some massive fish. One of them (not the biggest) she caught we were told was particularly nice to eat and they cooked it for us the next day. You can see in the photo: fish and chips! We went on a tour of one of the local islands. On the boat over we saw yet more dolphins, some of which came right up to the boat and swam along side us. It was a great experience to see where the local Maldivians live, and we were taken to see the island school where the children study up to the age of 10. If they want to continue their education after that they have to travel to Male, which is a 45 min sea plane flight away. You can see a picture of the school in the photos. We were also shown a covered area outside with a few tables and a tv high up in the corner. This is where the men gather to watch the football. It seems men across all continents are exactly the same then..... There is also a video of our villa |
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