Maldives cont.

Part IV – Dreams and Realizations

19/2 – 20/2 (Sunday – Monday)

This was supposed to be our last day according to the original tour package. It was the 4th day already! But it’s madness to leave this beautiful island so early. I paid for another 2 nights at the same hotel to match the available flight schedule…and now we have 3 days in total including today. Yay! We decided to went for a full day excursion at the 5 star luxury hotel – Adaaran Prestige in Vadoo Island. There are many resort excursions to choose from. It means that you are paying to use the private beach, facilities such as changing room, toilet, and sometimes the pool. Not all 5 star hotels provide this package though. It’s so cool because I know I won’t be able to afford that in the near future lol the boat waited for us at the jetty and it took us 20mins or so to reach Vadoo Island. The reception is so awesome with the staff ready to greet you at the entrance. There’s a small garden at the front before you can see the main building where the restaurant is at. The actual guests of the hotel watching us like these people ain’t gonna get in here for free lool it’s funny but I don’t think anyone cared since the place is amazing and everyone can’t wait to look around the compound like we can afford it 😅

You will get a sturdy wristband so that the staff can differentiate you from the actual guests and easy to group up when it’s time to leave. Drinking that fresh orange juice in a tall glass beside the private beach, you’re sure revved up for a luxury escapade in Maldives 😍
They briefed us the do’s and don’ts and we are free to explore and stay until sunset! I forgot to mention all this is for 100USD. So far the most I’ve paid in one single day so I’m gonna make sure it’s worth it. But the wait until lunchtime is sooo long….the original plan was to get in the waters after lunch (we kinda avoided sun unlike everyone else hahaha) because we haven’t really ate and felt hungry to actually play at the beach. It was really inviting though, the wildlife that you can spot just by looking at the beach. You don’t even have to look for them. There are an abundace of ‘friendly’ marine life such as baby sharks, stingrays, and eels.

It was amazing needless to say. And the over-water villas are situated next to the snorkelling area. You basically can jump right into it from your backdoor. I don’t have photos here as I left my camera’s battery back in our hotel -__-
The lunch area is separate from the guests but is very good with nice choices and tastes great. The ice cream served at the end, heck, I wish I wasn’t as full as I was. We met a staff who can speak our language and told us he has worked in our country for years that’s how he picked it up. He spoke really good northern accent by the way 😂 It made me realise that there were a lot of them back home and not just the usual Bangladeshi (since they look a bit similar). I feel a lil shocked for the fact that we Malaysians just barely reaching Maldives in like these past 3 years but they have been coming to us since more than 10 years ago. Lol. Air Asia’s tagline ‘Now Everybody can Fly’ is indeed true. I won’t even dreamed of stepping foot at the Maldives. Not in a million years! I feel privileged and thankful that I’m actually here.

We got back from Adaaran Prestige with a bunch of fun photos and videos in the clear waters. Even if it rains that evening, we continued playing around and wished our backyard remotely looked like this. The day ended with a shark feeding demo although it’s more like Tuna feeding because there weren’t that many sharks at the time. While the Tunas and Jackfish took the center stage while we hoomans were watching in awe from the small bridge above. We were even visited by a large pelican (I think it’s called??) that appeared ever so gracefully, near the people who wanted a picture of it. It was another amazing moment seeing all these wildlife around the resort. In the sunset light it served as the perfect backdrop. Dream honeymoon resort for sure 😉

The next day was really, really lazy. Waking up for breakfast seemed too much of a hassle. You know, one of those days when you’ve started to get accustomed to the vacation life. You don’t really wanna go anywhere exploring new things (Maafushi is just 1km+ long anyway) and take things super slowly. But tomorrow is our last day and we still haven’t finished exploring the whole island. So we decided to find Maafushi Prison and treating it as some kind of an investigation lol it was actually less than 4 mins walk towards the end of the island. It was freaky to drive past it last night when we rode a motorcycle with our guide.

I have never lived this near to any kind of prison in my life, like a lot of people. This particular prison is very interesting indeed – it houses the former president of Maldives M Nasheed. He was kinda ousted by his own cabinet that he finally had to declare hiw own resignation. His past lawyers included Amal Clooney. And the whole thing about his term and how he lose it is tells you a lot about this little country of atolls. Hint: it isn’t the first time things like this happen. Again I’m gonna repeat their political climate is an interesting thing to know especially once you were here and you get to talk to the locals. Their issues are pressing and very much stirred up. I think I downplayed everything because I have that assumption of paradise and escapism about Maldives (like everyone else on this planet! It’s well known as the ultimate honeymoon destination for all we know) I changed my mind. Climate change, economy, corruption in government, separation to form an independent nations, I don’t even know. Before I googled I wasn’t ready for all these information lol But I like researching and reading a general outlook of countries that I am going to. The thing that you can easily observe about this island country is how booming and crowded Male is. I wouldn’t say I was repulsed by it (like some of travel bloggers I’ve read simply hated it) I was maybe taken aback. It’s not like Singapore, an island nation that’s situated close to the mainland. This is Maldives, in the middle of the Indian Ocean! It’s quite a sight to take in.

The Maldives just recently refurbished their tourism to allow locals to operate their own guesthouses (that’s why there are so many sprang up) and it literally opened the door to a whole lot of travel opportunities to the average and below budget travellers. For the past decades or so it was just luxury hotels. Can you imagine the world cathing up on budget friendly Maldives in the future?? The island will be overloaded I think! There were even more artifical islands being made…it’s overwhelming when you think of it. Wait until you walk by foot in Male city the capital of Maldives, which I did on my last day.