Fresh off the high of that amazing Maldivian sunset (champagne-fuelled) cruise at the amazing Kandolhu island, we headed off for cocktails by moonlight (which somehow seems even more special than cocktails by bar-light 😉 ), before heading out to dinner.
I say ‘heading out’, we must have walked all of 10 steps to the Sea Grill restaurant where we would be having dinner.
As you arrive into the restaurant, you get a chance to check out the fresh seafood and ingredients that will be going into your meal before making a choice (not essential of course but it’s always good to know your seafood is fresh).
At the restaurant, I made the switch from cocktails to wine in preparation for dinner…
There were oven-baked flatbreads, which I actually think it may have been garlic naan breads – Lloyd ordered, I just muscled in on the order (so you’ll have to ask him).
I went with scallops – seared to perfection and Lloyd went with Tamatar Ka Shorba (a seafood chowder) to start.
Don’t judge me here (I kinda blame the wine a bit 😀 ) but instead of seafood, I went for an old favourite of mine – lamb. *In my defence, I got food envy from watching someone else’s order arrived and I’m so happy I did cos that lamb was deeeelicious!
Lloyd did the right thing on the seafood front and went for tuna (which doesn’t surprise me – he loves tuna) and judging from the “Mmmm… Tayssshhty” (or something that sounded like that), it was pretty good!
Dessert was crumble for me (and more wine) and a chocolate fondant for Lloyd. A brilliant way to end a brilliant meal before stumbling back to the villas for a well-earned kip.
The next morning, right after breakfast (which I didn’t get round to photographing properly but promised to the next day), we set off to go snorkeling properly.
If you don’t arrive on the island with any snorkelling gear, fret not – Kandolhu has you covered on all fronts and before long, we were splashing around the island in search of the colourful oceanic animals; and particularly keeping an eye out for a particularly exciting one – wild sea turtles.
We can across all kinds of fish (to attempt to start naming all of them now would be an exercise an a half… and result in a post that would be far too huge to read) before eventually coming across those famed sea turtles.
Like I mentioned in my previous post, Kandolhu island is a great place for spotting sea turtles (and dolphins, apparently) and it most certainly didn’t disappoint on this morning.
The turtles move surprisingly fast and actually let you get close enough to get a photo (though not too close, they’re still wild and can snap at your with their very hard beaks – plus you really don’t wanna disturb them, that’s be beside the point of snorkelling with a wild animal).
Chuffed to bits with our turtle sighting, and surprisingly very hungry, we decided to head back to the villa on time for lunch, a nice swim, right from our water villas and generally just a lazy afternoon.
The only other plan of the day was to have a 90 minute massage and just to relax in the spa and that’s just what we did. I may have even snuck in a little pre-massage snooze. The massages were absolutely perfect (I could so be the kind of person that would have daily massages).
It was just the perfect idyllic day – the kinda of day the Maldives are all about really.
For dinner, we decided to head up to Olive – the island’s Mediterranean restaurant. The view from up here of the ocean is pretty great though my favourite part about this restaurant is dining with the sound of the waves lapping at the shore. It’s one of those subtle details that somehow ends up defining moments like this and thoroughly sets you at ease for the entire evening.
We started off with oysters and salmon (not strictly Mediterranean but still very delicious)…
…before moving on to calamari
…swiftly followed by a culinary trip to Italy with risotto (for Lloyd) and lasagna for myself.
For dessert, we headed over to France with a pretty epic crème brulee (soooo not helping my crème brulee addiction but I ain’t complaining… 😉 ).
The rest of that evening was spent listening to those waves, accompanied with a bottle of white wine, or as we say back in Italy (gimme a second, while I google this…) ‘vino bianco’.
The next morning was our final morning in the Maldives, and after almost two weeks here, I intended on starting the day as I’d grown accustomed to – with a breakfast fit for a king!
I couldn’t decide if I wanted the eggs benedict or the pancakes so I just decided to go for them both. And yes, I have no regrets here. They were both absolutely perfect. To be honest, if you’re into your food – this is the island to be, the food here is pretty special!
All packed and ready to go, the rest of the afternoon was spent as all good afternoons in the Maldives should be, with cocktails on the beach with occasional breaks between sipping cocktails for a quick dip to cool off.
Saying farewell to such an amazing island (and some pretty amazing people) wasn’t easy but leaving with incredible memories from being spoilt rotten kinda helps alleviate that feeling a little. This is after all, one of my absolute favourite islands in the Maldives…
On the way back, we had the boat, and then the seaplane all to ourselves (kinda felt like a fitting farewell to the Maldives – almost like it had been planned – hehe!) before heading back home from Male.
A big reason why I decided to return to the Maldives after having just visited earlier in the year was primarily because the first visit just didn’t feel like enough. We’d cut that first visit into half the time as we decided to go to Sri Lanka for part of that time and I felt like there was so much more I wanted to see and do in the Maldives after our first visit.
This’d made you think that this time around, after almost two weeks, I’d have had my fill of the Maldives but that couldn’t be even further from the truth. I already miss the Maldives and I’m so looking forward to returning to this absolutely amazing and utterly stunning part of the world.
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