Its been a long time that people of Male' felt the need of such a place. Due to over population and the rapid development taking place, people had forgotten about the importance of recreation and what it can bring to our lives and health. However over time, the need for such recreation places was felt badly by the government and this project came in to light couple of years back. Before, we have to get out of Male' and travel to some other island to enjoy a decent swim, but this has changed today. Anyone can just go for a quick dip at artificial beach and though its not comparable to a natural beach, its still better than having nothing.

Today it is not only a popular place for swimmers, but a variety of sports, games shows and other events such as live music shows as well. On a regular day, it is a place for swimmers, children, parents and active sportsman. On special occasions, it is a place for get together, music shows, carnivals, parades and you name it. On Fridays the beach is quite packed, so consider this fact before getting there for a swim.

Maldives is is known as a tourist destination, but many might not know that there are about 1190 Island in the Maldives, about 80 islands are tourist island, and 200 are inhabited, and about 50 or so are used for other industrial activities. Rest of the islands are left untouched, so we use some of the uninhabited islands for agricultural purposes and other fisheries related developments.

Isand of Ifuru is locatedin Raa Atoll, Maldives. This is an untouched island only few crops are grown on the island particularly watermillon, brinjol tomato etc. one thing I want everyone to notice here is the vegetation of the island, since these island are extremely small, the vegetation in the island does not have much of variety of plants. The vegetation in theisland can be devided into coastal plants, such as phemphis, scaveola tournafortia and just inside the outer coastl vegetation a the inner vegetation consists of screw pine and some schrubs and trees at the central part of the island dominated by mature big trees such as coconut banyan tree etc. This is just to give you all a feel of vegetation successtion in Maldivian island. enjoy the photos.

Very often I have used in my blog the word "Short eats"  Local Name (Hedhika) made from mainly tuna fish and and other ingridents, theyc ome with different shapes and taste, generally they are spicy, for non locals, but some of these are sweets also,  they just look like these photos. These phots are taken from a community made offering in one of the island for a local company staffs working to dredge a harbour in Vaavu Atoll Felidhoo, South of Maldives. Harbour is a necessary infrstructure for most of the islanders, harbours provide safe morring areas for Local Dhoani (Boats)  but they are not in all island,  therefore having a habour is considered a luxary rather than a necessity sometimes.

This is a very famous restaurent in the capital of Maldives, Male. famous for bussiness lunches and romantic dinners at night. This is an outdoor restaurent at the sea side, so you can see all the launches and boat passing by Male, very nice view generally. The disadvantage is that in windy times you might get little bit of seaspray. The food is very good includes western and oriental dishes as well as light meals (sandwitches snacks and local short eats HEDHIKA) and particulalry cofee at night and through out the day. This is a hangout for couples for cofee and dating particularly during the night. The overall environment of the restaurent is bit dark during the night, parfect for romantic candle light dinners. There is a Srilankan food restuarent at one corner of this restaurent for those who fancy that can also sit and order various types of Srilankan food from the restaurent. The restaurent also holds weddings, birthday parties and other function.

Class resort, having not been to the Maldives before we didnt know what to expect. Being only 24 at the time of travel I thought we may get bored or 2 weeks here, i was not bored for a second. Once you arrive at Male, we where meet by Thomas Cook staff who pointed us onto the Royal Island check in area. We passed our bags onto Royal Island staff. We where then taken to a small bus to take us to the sea plane terminal. After a short wait our sea plane was ready. A seaplane is s must and worth the extra. After a 40 min flight we had arrived in paradise! crystal clear waters, perfect white sands and the most welcoming staff. The 148 rooms are all the same, small villas with open air bathroom and decking at the back looking out the the crystal waters. Bottled water is given in the room each day, there is also a mini bar which is not included on A/I. The hotels has 1 large pool witha small kids area in the pool. We where A/I as its very expensive to go B&B or anything but A/I. The food was 1st class, different very day with fresh fish daily. There is a bar where you can get snacks and A La Carte and a Buffet. (A La Carte is extra on A/I). There is many water sports available which is included on A/I also a few shops, where you can get snacks, post cards etc. The resort also run trips, they include island hoping, fishing day/night, deserted island trip, along with many others all well worth it. The hotel staff are very friendly, as soon as you drink is empty theres a new one in front of you. The chefs remember how you like your eggs etc which was good. Worth the money although I only paid 25% of the holiday thanks to working for Thomas Cook. But was worth what they charge, We have seen returned to Maldives, staying at Komandoo. Even though we had a Water Villa here Royal Island was still far better.

This is very famous small local teashop at the corner of the Henvery football field. This tea shop offer local short eats and meals mainly curry and rice during lunch and dinnert time, and short eats mainly made of fish and coconut, curry etc during morning and evening tea times. The shop is famouse for cleanliness and offering very fresh food. Recently this place has become the hangout for political people particularly those are residence to the Henvery area of Male. There is an open chess playing area just infront of the tea shop. This has become a hangout for the interested chess players who want challeng diffent players from different areas of Male. There are only few places that offers chess playing at the street corners. This kind of places are local gossiping areas. if you want an update of local news and hot gossips of the capital island, this is the place to be.

This is one of the famous cofee hangouts in Male, shorteats as well as meals are available here but most of the people go there to have cofee, and light drinks and discuss the current affiars mainly internal political issues. You can find middle class politicians here throughout the day and get an update of the most recent poolitical affiars of the country. Nice Coffee Lavaza and Nescafe are available here, and this is the only plcae you can get a Lavaza for 10 MRF which is less than a dollar. The place is packed particulalry late at night. The prime time of the cofee shop is from 10pm to 01am. Most of the waiters here are from Bangladesh or India so they dont understand neither Maldivian nor english, and very often you have to shout to get the attention of the waiters. Unfortunately this is a bad habbit becoming very common in Maldives particularly in small cafes and tea shops.

As the name implies this is one of the Thai food retaurents in the Capital of Maldives Male. It is a small restaurent with Thai tradition setting and sitting arrangements. The food in the restaurent is just like any thai restaurent abroad, but tasete is more or less original, because the cook is a Thai National. Famous thai dishes and short eats are available. It is expensive but perfect for bussiness lunches and dinners. need to be booked early because the space is very limited. Well this is one of the few places you can find Thai food in Male. enjoy

Is not four seasons or one and only but it's one of the best considering its price.

Thank God its Friday!!! Since my move to Addu Atoll in the Maldives Friday is one of the most interesting day to look foward to.  It's the day I usually hang out with the Dhi boys, Alex and Tony included and just spend the whole day on the beach.  The only painful thing is I have to wake up early on my off day which by now even at this condition I still look forward to waking up at 6.45am, instead of lazing or curling myself in bed.

Today is Kandihera day, its one of the uninhabited islands around Addu but its famous for its corals and marine life.  Was pretty excited about this been looking forward for the last couple of days already.

The house reef at this island is fabulous, however since making it in to a five star resort I feel that the specialness of the island has been lost. It is now full of sea villas, which has spoilt the islands tranquility.

As I've said I wasn't sure about taking the boat to the airport at midnight, but there was nothing I could do about it although I was nervous all day about it.

We did very little other than finish packing...I wasn't feeling great so I went for a nap and when I woke up we ordered some dinner from room service. We did sit out for a little while although the wind was getting quite fierce which didn't make me look forward to the boat trip anymore! It's not that I get seasick, I just don't like not feeling entirely safe!

We really enjoyed our time at Reethi Rah, it's just a shame the weather wasn't better, but there's nothing we or anyone else could have done about it so there's no point moaning about it. There was enough else to do...be it read or go to the spa or just chill out that we couldn't complain. For me just having free time to read when I want and doze off to sleep if I needed to was one of the best things about the trip (I work odd and long hours, so my sleep pattern is usually shot to pieces)!

We headed round to reception in our buggy at 11.40pm, settled up and said goodbye to our villa host (who's name totally escapes me, but he was lovely), jumped on the boat and headed for Male. I admit I slept most of the way and from what I hear I was glad I did...it was pretty choppy and Mark said he didn't feel totally secure on a number of occasions.

Collected my bottle of gin from customs at the airport and we were off once more...Dubai bound, and this time we were stopping! Yay!

Although this was officially our last day, we were actually staying on Reethi Rah until midnight the next day. Fortunately, the manager - Knut - had let us stay in the villa until we had to leave for the boat which was great, otherwise we would have had to check out at midday and use a courtesy villa to shower and change.

We had a lovely lazy day...the weather was glorious and we just baked ourselves (bad I know but I feel so much better bronzed). We started to pack and ended up watching the film 'Derailed' with Jennifer Aniston and Clive Owen...excellent! We had to push our dinner reservation back an hour because we were enjoying it so much. Din-Dins were taken at Reethi and we ended up having a really early night because we'd been out in the sun so much and I find that always makes me tired.

Tonight was one of the three nights out of ten we had a decent enough sunset to take pictures...it's a habit I've inherited from my Dad, who hardly takes any photos of people on holiday (at least not family members!) and mostly shoots sunsets and landscapes. Perhaps he doesn't want to be reminded who he's with...the cheek of it! Anyway, hope you like the sunset shots! :D

Clearly I'm taking my inspiration for titles from songs, but that's kind of logical because Mark's a music teacher/ trained opera singer...so I never get peace and quiet! :D

Anyway, another wonderful day which we spent at Breakfast, at the beach and then we went for afternoon tea at around 4.30pm, which consisted of freshly made mini-donuts, fruit cake and iced tea, and if I'm honest, was one of the most disappointing things about the whole time in the Maldives. We've stayed at Reethi Rah's sister hotel, the Royal Mirage in Dubai, and afternoon tea there (which is also complimentary) is outstanding...fresh chocolates, sandwiches, tea, coffee, soft drinks, gateaux’s, etc, etc. But that's one of the few things we weren't happy with and we raised it with the Food & Beverage Manager (who'd come to RR from the Royal Mirage) and he said it was on his list of things to improve.

As a result, we were a bit peckish and ordered a pizza between us and I had a French Martini...it very nearly blew my head off! It was fantastic but between us we were both rather tipsy and our driving back to the villa was perhaps a bit erratic!

Dinner tonight was our candlelit meal in Reethi...we were pretty disappointed when we saw the menu was set, and Mark isn't keen on seafood and the starter and main were both fishy. So we spoke to our friend the F&B manager and he took us on a tour of the kitchen and let us pick out whatever we wanted from the storeroom! We both had a Wagyu Fillet steak which was superb! The only complaint I have about the food at RR is that the main restaurant menu is a bit restricted and although there's daily specials, some were very fussy and odd...one more restaurant wouldn't go amiss on the island, especially when the weather's not so good during July/ August, i.e., Monsoon season.

We had an amazing meal and a lovely complimentary bottle of wine which is always nice! Tomorrow is our last full day on the island, although our boat transfer to the airport doesn't leave 'til midnight, tomorrow will be the last time we go to bed here. Ah well...I wasn't altogether convinced that the yacht would make it to the airport in the pitch black but we've been assured it does the run at all hours.

I'm a really keen scuba diver, and the last time I was in the Maldives (with my parents in 2004) I did 3 dives, the last a drift dive along a reef which teemed with sharks chasing tuna...it was fantastic!

This time I knew I probably wouldn't do as many dives...mark isn't a diver and he's also not the best on choppy seas and today was a bit more overcast (but still dry, that's the main thing) so I booked in for one dive to see what things were like, although I knew I had to do my last dive 'tomorrow' before we flew.

So, after a lovely day lounging on the beach in the sun, I headed round to the dive centre, which was right beside reception. I was on a boat with the hotel manager and some other guests, and was buddied with one of the dive masters, which I was quite pleased with...I'm never too confident just swimming off with another non-local diver!

We zoomed out to the reef on one of the centre's boats, and jumped in. I just about toppled over the edge of the boat...I've never been very good at staggering around with the tank and fins on! We dropped down to about 10metres and drifted along on a bit of a current. We saw one shark pretty far off in the distance and a mean looking Moray Eel peered out at us from a rock, but other than that, it wasn't the most exciting of dives...the water was chilly and with bad visibility, and I was quite glad to get back to the surface if I'm honest. I was cold and bored...so no more dives this holiday. Mark also panics when I do daft things like diving, so I think he was glad I was back on land in one piece and not wanting to go out again. I'm just glad he wasn't with me when I bungee jumped in 2001!

So we had another yummy dinner to look forward to...I had fabulous fresh pasta with prawn and salmon, cherry tomatoes and capers, and my favourite Caprese salad to start with lots of balsamic vinegar on it!

We'd booked our Candlelit Dinner for tomorrow night, which is part of the hotel's 'treats' for honeymooners.

And so to bed...