FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Honeymooning in Australia, Maldives, Sri Lanka, and Dubai (UA/EK/BA F, SQ J)
Old Dec 16, 2013, 9:24 pm
  #20  
sfoactuary
 
Join Date: Jan 2011
Location: San Francisco
Programs: AS MVP Gold, Hilton Diamond
Posts: 699
7. Conrad Maldives Rangali Island (cont'd)

Food & Beverage

The food and beverage on the resort are truly outstanding and were a big highlight for us. This started each morning with the breakfasts which are complimentary for Hilton Gold/Diamond members, and can be had either at Atoll Market (buffet) or Vilu Restaurant which they describe as semi-a la carte. Basically there is a small buffet, and you can order as many hot entrees as you like off the menu. Each day we tended to eat huge breakfasts which held us over to dinner for the most part. We would cobble together lunch/snack each day with some of the complimentary fruit that was provided each day in the room along with my precious pork jerky that had been smuggled into the country

Samplings from Atoll market breakfast buffet





Maldivian omelet at Vilu


Eggs Florentine at Vilu


One of the most enjoyable experiences was getting to meet quite a few fellow FTers and catching up on all the latest points/miles news with them. The 4-5pm afternoon tea at Mandhoo and 5-6pm happy hours at Vilu were especially great for meeting up. So definitely keep an eye out and don't be afraid to ask "hey, are you on flyertalk?" as I rarely received no as an answer.

There are really a lot of options for dinner and can range from a la carte dining either in-room or at the bar, to full on degustation meals with wine parings. We ate at Rangali bar for 2 of the nights, and found the food to be really good. The pizza, burger, and Maldivian lobster were some of the things we particularly liked. We also benefited by not being big drinkers which can easily add up as wine/cocktails average $15-20. For those that are interested, the Rangali bar also has hookahs/shishas which were great for kicking back while listening to the live music.

For the other three nights we ate at a few different restaurants. We had our complimentary 3-course honeymoon dinner at Mandhoo which was amazing, both the food and the setting. Our first night we ate at Sunset grill which ironically didn't have as nice of a sunset as Mandhoo, but was still quite enjoyable. And lastly, we had the cheese fondue dinner in the Wine cellar which was really fun and interactive.

Sunset grill view


Sunset grill shrimp/scallops


Sunset grill seafood platter


Mandhoo restaurant


Dinner with a view


Mandhoo complimentary honeymoon dinner


Mandhoo amuse bouche


Mandhoo calamari/salmon appetizer


Mandhoo chicken with pumpkin risotto


Wine Cellar for fondue night


Bleu cheese soup


Marscapone cheese dessert


Rangali Bar pizza


Rangali Bar Maldivian lobster


Final Thoughts

So, what's the verdict on the self-proclaimed 6-star resort? It's pretty darn amazing, one of the most beautiful places I've ever been, and I can't wait to go back. While we were there the resort was at 90% occupancy and at most times still felt like we were the only ones there. And from the FTer perspective, even with the devaluation it's still a good value at 95,000 points per night when compared to retail prices.

BUT, don't go in thinking that everything will be perfect, because you will be setting yourself up for disappointment. We did run into a few issues (primarily on our last night) which put a damper on things, but overall we found that the staff/management response was very prompt and met our expectations. As a tip on one of the issues, I would make sure to be proactive about the seaplane departure schedule as we were shocked to find out the night before that we were booked on a 7am seaplane despite having a 3pm departure out of MLE. We never got a clear answer on why that happened since departure information is provided at check-in time so we suspect there was some sort of mix-up. So make sure to check-in with our host earlier in the day to confirm that your details are correct.

Until next time!
sfoactuary is offline