SKT-DK

What a trip! Lovely read, and I am happy to hear you managed to cope with the flights despite the choppy conditions

I hear you on the crazily priced underwater restaurant - we did the same at the Conrad when we visited, just for the experience. But at least they do a drinks only round of service before dinner (to maximise revenue of course). When in Rome, and all that..

Hope the weather on your return will be more smooth!

SKT-DK

Seaplanes are fun! But as TheGrunch said, do not let that put you off - plenty of speed boat options (Waldorf comes to mind). Maldives is stunning, and something definitely worth trying
at least once

VorelNaCestach

I would be more tempted to pick one of those bottles than a dessert. But also the selection of desserts looked amazing. Did you try them all?


I have flown it once and wouldn't call it fun. Luckily, it wasn't as bad as TheGrunch's experience. I will keep in mind to check speed boat options when I will be planning my trip to Maldives. thanks for the tips.

TheGrunch

I definitely didn't leave enough room after eating 5 courses and lots of lobster beforehand! I don't have a massive sweet tooth, but I did try 2-3 small desserts - could not refuse!

There are plenty of resorts with speedboat transfers and the boats are literally just outside of the main airport terminal - so no bus transfer, you are straight there, not sure if that will change though when the new terminal opens.

injian

loving the TR so far, very well written and informative!

really sucks to read and hear about the seaplane ride but looks like youve developed your sea wings!

TheGrunch

Thank you - I definitely have and it's all part of the experience, at the end of the day it was only 45 minutes, we got there safely and I would not hesitate to do it all again! You're always going to feel 'everything' in such a small plane.

TheGrunch

So after many more meals, drinks, lounging, snorkelling (completely amazing to see tropical fish not in a tank!), swimming the warm ocean and a visit to the spa, our 9 night stay was coming to an end… the morning before our last we had the floating breakfast delivered to our villa. The idea being that you sit in your private plunge pool whilst eating breakfast - but it was too cold - perfect for refreshing in the afternoons, but not for eating breakfast, nonetheless it was lovely to have breakfast on our terrace overlooking the ocean.

Again this was part of the Honeymoon package and was a nice touch.

TheGrunch

I would highly recommend the You & Me resort - it was small enough to be intimate, but large enough to have a good range of restaurants and activities should you want to partake. It certainly wasn’t a party island, most entertainment was low key and everything closed at 11/12pm, but we were always back in our villa by then, it suited us. The staff really makes the resort, they just cannot do enough for you and nothing is too much trouble. In particular, our island host was wonderful and quickly helped us out with any questions, when we were leaving we told her we’d love to come back and have the exact same villa and she said she would be able to do that for us! Our room service chap was wonderful, always keeping our fridge stocked up and decorating the bed - they clean twice a day!

9 nights was the right duration, a week would have felt too short and 2 weeks would have been too long as I think you would have wanted to do ‘more’ and then the costs start to mount up!!

All good things (mostly) come to an end, and so at 08:20 on our last day, it was time to board the seaplane again - this time in much kinder weather!



The staff even wave you goodbye as you taxi off!

TheGrunch

A much, much smoother ride with virtually no cloud and no turbulence, we had another pick up en-route and every single seat was filled, it seemed to take forever to take off second time around with all the extra weight!

Landing at Male around 45 minutes later, we were met again by one of the resort’s staff who got us onto the bus to the terminal. Then another resort member met us at the terminal and helped us get our bags and into the departure’s queue…. Male is truly chaotic and I really do hope it improves with the new terminal, the queue just to get through the first round of security and bag check-in was around 40 minutes, just one huge tensa barrier maze and no proper air conditioning. Then the first security scanners, where all your bags get put through, directly before the bag check-in desks…. Another queue at the Emirates check-in and it took forever as the baggage belts behind them were full and they could not load more bags - more chaos!!

One the bags were checked in and we got our boarding passes, it was upstairs to clear passport control, more security and through to departures - at least time there was air conditioning, but it felt like kilometres of tensa barriers and queues, to get through to the departure gates probably took another 45-50 minutes. The end result being that we literally had about half an hour before they started boarding the plane! We didn’t bother joining the queue until it actually started to move a bit and the buses were flowing from the gate properly!

Eventually boarded the 777 to Dubai and was just glad to have a comfortable seat! This time we were in the middle row and for some reason, it felt like we had far more room. We weren’t too late taking off and it was a smooth flight.

I’d stuck with the standard meal for this flight, even though I knew it would be pasta salad (you can check the menu with Emirates ahead of time) it was only small….

The drinks service with the meals was a bit haphazard, I asked for a glass of wine and the guy for some reason would only serve soft drinks and said his colleague would serve me - even though he had wine on the trolley - perhaps it was a religion thing, but it got forgotten and I had to ask! There are always crew passing and they never mind you asking for drinks. A couple nearby had the crew making every combination of cocktails including Bloody Mary’s, with the spirits and mixers!!



Perfectly acceptable meal all round, I do like the little cheese and crackers too!

TheGrunch

The flight was going really well to Dubai and we were set to land a little early, I quite like landings as I’ve had someone talk me through all the noises and I feel comfortable with them and understand the process - and it means I am getting off the plane soon! Unfortunately, luck was running out and I experienced my first TOGA, we were a couple of hundred feet from the runway which we were watching from the onboard cameras, when all of a sudden the landing was aborted. I was unprepared and freaked out, even hubby who has flown way more than me has never had one and of course, I started thinking the worst. Eventually after what felt like forever, the captain announced that we’d become unstable in the approach (I guess Dubai suffers with wind gusts etc being next to the dessert) and he was obtaining clearance to have another attempt, but did warn us that it could happen again.

So I mentally prepared myself for a second go around, but thankfully after a bumpy approach he got us down and the entire plane cheered and clapped LOL - at that point I knew we’d overcome something for the captain to get a round of applause.

TheGrunch

Dubai is a beautiful and huge airport, stunning indoor waterfalls that are 100s of feet high - wish I’d taken photos! Despite being in the same Terminal, you still have to go through security scanners again, then to get to our A380 gate we had to use the monorail train.

Then another security check for Emirates before you go through to the gate…. We didn’t have time to really explore, the gate was already open when we arrived.

At Dubai Emirates had electronic boarding pass scanners, it was a pleasant boarding experience.

We’d decided mid-holiday to see if we could get extra legroom seats…. We couldn’t on the Male-Dubai leg as the plane was full, but we’d managed it on the Dubai-Heathrow leg, which was more important. It was just over £90 each and I am sooooo glad we did, being next to the galley and having all that space was pretty much as good as being business class tbh as the Emirates experience is so good anyway, especially on the A380.



I’d ordered the Gluten Free for this leg, as there was afternoon tea as well as the main meal served and I didn’t want to risk all that bread. I forgot a photo of the afternoon tea, it was a sandwich and cake, but by that point I wasn’t too hungry anyway.

I would definitely pay for extra legroom seats again and would not hesitate to fly with Emirates long-haul, the whole experience was very good - I heard they are going to replace all the A380s with 777s which would be a shame as the A380 is a magnificent plane and you barely realise you’re flying at all.

It was a very uneventful landing at Heathrow, barely a bump and we were down and not too much holding either, a very long taxi to the gate but we’d landed early.

There was a huge queue to get through passport security, which was annoying as actually when we got there, it was all electronic with all the scanners open, so I am not sure what the hold up was. The scanners worked just fine and thankfully both bags were waiting for us. All that remained was to find the car at the Meet & Greet car park, which was there waiting for us and try and get warm again after dropping 30 degrees in temperature!!!

Hope you’ve all enjoyed this, sorry I didn’t take as many photos as I’d have liked - mostly food oriented haha

Thanks to JapesUK for inspiring me to write this TR Next holiday booked (at my insistence on the Honeymoon) to Lefkada, Greece - flying Jet2 from BRS to PVK in July - thought I’d better take the kids this time around - they’ve flown way more than me too!

TheGrunch

Oh, and because I can’t work out how to get the profile picture on properly - here is ‘The Grunch’ - my name sake is my little elderly dog who earned her name from her looks

The Grunch (aka Elsa)

offerendum

I would choose exactly the same place

JapesUK

Nutty nuts Did they come with cheesy cheese?

TheGrunch

Haha good spot, I hadn't seen that! The cheese - I forgot the brand name - but it was British, proper Cheddar cheese - so yes, definitely cheesy cheese!