Let us know if you see her! Looks like she's still there on her Instagram.

she is in room 301. Please ask her not to trash it.

on Saturday ill arrive with my family to stay 10 nights! Are there any other FT's at the W?

We get in on May 11

I just booked a last-minute solo trip, and I think I'll be at the W as well - arriving May 11, too. 😀 Just deciding for sure whether to go with the W or St Regis. Seems W wins for sea life, and St R for luxury. I'm torn - same number of Bonvoy points (roughly), but the St R has a much higher $ cost.

I’m in the same boat as you. I have a trip planned in Aug for the W, but am afraid that it will not live up to expectations as I’ve been to the St. R. The St. Regis is beyond luxurious and the base over water villas are significantly bigger. At the W, the room opens directly to the bed and there is no sofa living space, while this is not the case at the St. R. However from the pictures and reviews of the W, the reef and sand/beach quality is significantly nicer than the St.R. The St R beach can best be described as rocky. If they were the exact same number of points, I would probably choose the St. R. The “reef” at the St Regis, which probably not as good as W, still has tons of fish and even turtles.

For my case, for a 5 night stay in Aug, for the W I am deciding to pay the lower than usual cash (still expensive) rate vs spending 400k points, as there is a $750++ (plus sea plane transfer and tax) half board rate through Marriott luminous which includes dinner at Kitchen.

I've only been to the W, so can't compare StR, but can confirm the beach/sand at W is fantastic. Super soft and clean, not rocky in any way whatsoever. We'd typically walk "home" from dinner along the beach rather than on the path.

Reasonable critique of the room size/layout, but for us, we spent very little time in the room, so it didn't matter much.

That $750 rate is really darn good. Kitchen has the least interesting food of the three restaurants for dinner, but quality was still really good. So if you prioritize beach/relaxation/reef quality way more over food, then it totally makes sense.

Last sea plane?
 

Does anyone know what time the last seaplane departs the W to go to the airport?

I have an option of a flight leaving MLE at 5:35pm or at 10pm so wanted to see if it was worth doing the 10 to take a later flight or keep the 5:35pm flight.

Do they still open up the departure lounge?

I flew out on a ~2pm flight IIRC, and there was one later seaplane flight than that the day I departed. My flight out of MLE departed at ~8pm so I actually would have preferred to get the later seaplane flight but it seems they try to balance out people's MLE wait time somewhat, so the available seats on the last seaplane flight were reserved for people flying on later redeyes. But the schedule can also change somewhat day to day, so it's hard to predict exactly what might happen with either flight option.

Frankly, MLE is not the most fun place to hang out, and the 10pm departure would guarantee you have at least a 4-5 hour layover, whereas the 5:35pm flight there's a chance you get put on a seaplane flight where you have a more reasonable 2-3 hour layover, so I would stay with the 5:35pm flight. But up to you.

great thanks a lot! I’ll keep my 5:35 flight.

Covid Test
 

Maldives website states the need to have a recent negative Covid test upon arrival. We are vaccinated, and curious what tests are available that Maldives will accept that are not the deep tissue nose swabs?

Seam plan / Boat
 

Noticed a reference above regarding boat instead of sea plane. Is that an option to Meridien? Anyone with a link?

They require a PCR test which will almost certainly be a nasal swab but may differ in whether the sample is collected from deeper in the nasal cavity or not.

Do u live in the US? I used pixel and cvs (had a backup just in case I didn't get results in time) - both are self administered and easy - and not painful!

I'm flying on Tuesday. I have tests scheduled for Friday and Saturday, the former through my employer which offers free testing either in-person or at home, the latter through testing run by the county, just in case.

The fact that a self-test with no observation is accepted sort of defeats the purpose. You can just drop the swab in the tube unused and send it in for guaranteed negative result.