Best...Vacation Spot...Ever

After the heavy sight-seeing schedule we kept in Sri Lanka, we were really looking forward to the next phase of our trip, laying on the beach in the Maldives. Our flight took us from Colombo to the capital of the Maldives, Male, in a one-hour flight over the Indian Ocean. The Maldives are a group of islands and atolls which make up their own nation in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Locals are confined to just a few islands, and most of the rest of the islands are owned by resorts. For our vacation, Jodi set us up with rooms at the Conrad Maldives Resort on Rangali Island. This was by far the nicest resort I've ever stayed in. I knew we were in for a good deal when we were met at the airport by representatives from the resort and driven to catch our seaplane connection to the island. While waiting for some other guests making the connection, we were given juice and complementary head and neck massages in a plush, air-conditioned lounge. Finally, our seaplane was ready to go and we took a short thirty-minute ride to reach the resort. The plane dropped us off at our resort, which was two small islands connected by a long bridge.

After signing in at reception, we were shown to our beach villa. The villa was well-furnished and comfortable, and best of all was only about twenty feet from the beach.

Despite being fully booked, the resort was spread out just enough to make it feel like you had the beaches to yourself. We spent an amazing three days laying out on the beach, getting spa treatments, reading, and swimming in the crystal blue lagoon surrounding the island. We also tried our hand at snorkeling, and there was a house reef located just fifty yards off of the beach. At night we gorged ourselves at the resort's gourmet restaurants.

Me and Jodi with our sushi igloos.

View of the island from the spa.

With Jodi on the beach.

Swimming Jodi

The over-water restaurant

Romantic bathtub in the room

Sun, sand and seclusion

The resort dhoni at dusk

Finally, after three full days in paradise, it was time to head back to India (or as I like to call it, the anti-paradise). We boarded our seaplane and headed back to Male. Since we had a few hours before our connection back to Colombo and then India, we took a ferry from the airport over to the city. Male itself is very small, with a largely Muslim local population. There's also not much to see, so we just did a quick walking tour around the city to get a feel for it.

View of Male from the ferry.

The Grand Friday Mosque.

After our quick jaunt around the city, we boarded our plane back to Colombo. Unfortunately, our flight was delayed and we missed our connection back to India which caused us to have to spend the night at the airport in Colombo. We finally made it back to Wellington the next day, and we were down to the last few days of our vacation together.