Originally Posted by Weatherboy

The biggest expense for my trip were my meals/drinks moreso than the upgrade.

I don't get the value of the half-board option --it's not really a savings, but moreso a pre-payment of their Atoll dinner buffet. The half-board option was $70 and gets you dinner at the Atoll buffet -or- a 25% discount on a special meal. But with special meals averaging $260/person , the max discount you'd get is about $63 --which means you're paying $70 for a $63 discount. The dinner at Atoll is the same price whether you pay as you go or you pre-pay through the half-board option.

During my stay, I only felt like eating dinner there once... so had I gone the half-board route, I would have been wasting a lot of money.

The best way to save money on this trip though is to stick with Atoll Market and skip all the special meals. The buffet food is nice ...although if it were to be offered on the US mainland, it'd probably be priced closer to $35. If you go the route of a big complimentary breakfast, an afternoon poolside cocktail, and the Atoll market, you could probably skate by with about $100/day on food-drink.

But the Maldives are really paradise...so I'd recommend people to go only if they can splurge. Or at least splurge on at least one night (like do the Wine Cellar Dinner and stick to the buffet the rest of the nights.)

I considered myself on a fairly strict budget and didn't want to spend huge amounts of money on the trip. I was willing to spend $300-500/night for an upgrade, so when the upgrade was only a fraction of that, I did re-invest that money into the spa visit and special dinners.