19 April 2024

 

Maldives

We offer a wide choice of cheap flights to Maldives together with Maldives hotels, tours and self-drive itineraries.

Pleasure Island

Who said the Maldives were just for grown-ups? SAM LEITH and his family find a child-friendly refuge that doesn’t compromise on luxury

Maldives - It's own island paradise: The Hilton Maldives - Ocean breezes for each guest Maldives - On deck for fantastic views

1 It's own island paradise: The Hilton 2 Ocean breezes for each guest 3 On deck for fantastic views

YOU GO TO the Maldives for your honeymoon. You go to the Maldives to sit in the turquoise water with a margarita, a straw hat and that long novel you never got round to reading. You do not go to the Maldives – conventional wisdom would have it – with your pregnant girlfriend and an 18-month-old toddler.

You get through a large number of SpongeBob sticker-books on the flight! A seaplane hop takes you on to the impressive Hilton Iru Fushi island resort. The Hilton, like most resorts of its kind, is set around a small private island. About half the rooms are on stilts over the shallow lagoon, but we took one of the detached ground-floor suites on terra firma, with French windows at the back that open onto a sandy path leading directly on to your own bit of beach.

Not bad. After a sound night’s sleep, we woke up and discovered the meaning of the phrase ‘a new dawn’. Surprisingly enough, in the kingdom of the honeymooner, the one-child family is king.

This is a world of private beaches, outdoor showers, shaded divans, spa baths and lobster grilled straight from the sea.

Kobe beef is flown in from Japan, and strawberries come from Europe half the year and Australia the other half. The full-board set-up is great for children. They can pile spaghetti carbonara, cinnamon swirls, kung po chicken and roast beef onto the same plate to their heart’s content.

For picky tots, a four-corners-of-the-earth buffet is heaven.

As an adult – once you’ve got over the disconcerting feeling of having nothing whatsoever to do – it’s very nice, too. You eat well. You drink well. You commute from beach to poolside to restaurant to poolside to beach. And the surrounds are just as lovely as the brochures suggest. On the beach, hermit crabs the size of a thumbnail amble by in white whorls of shell, and ghost crabs – amazingly fast-moving – fly across the sand at evening just above the waterline.

You commute from beach to poolside to restaurant to poolside to beach

At night, at the end of the monsoon season, phosphorescent plankton wash ashore and fringe the beach with luminous glitter. If you splash through them, they glow brighter. But you’d enjoy none of that were it not for the child-friendliness, the resort’s number one concern. Protected by the house reef, the waters immediately around the resort are reassuringly docile.

The sand slopes down at a shallow angle, and the waves are so gentle even a toddler can withstand them. Yet, no further out than waist-deep, bright fish flicker around patches of coral, giving pleasure to even the most incompetent (or under-age) snorkeller.

My daughter Marlene spent half of each day attempting to pick up the picturesque white rocks around the family pool and heave them into the water, and the other half leaping happily off the shallow submerged ledge around the pool into deeper water, butterflying safely away on her armbands.

Hours passed without complaint, and she slept like a log. Moving around the island – thanks to staff who, like henchmen in a Bond movie, patrol ceaselessly on golf buggies – is also made easy. The word ‘buggy’ entered my daughter’s vocabulary. Had we stayed any longer, she would certainly have mastered summoning one from the phone in the room.

Best of all, there is a substantial creche – an activity room stuffed with toys, games and nannies. In-room childcare is available, too, if you want it. Here, then, is your opportunity to leave your little darlings and fill up on red snapper and claret in one of the a la carte restaurants. Of course one could say that in a way it’s artificial.

A beach that’s combed daily to remove every trace of dirt, cigarette ends or sign of human use has an element of artificiality. Breakfasts at home almost never contain Swiss cheese and Parma ham. But I like a little lack of raw, real life authenticity in my holidays. Who wouldn’t? We have quite enough reality the rest of the year.

This article was featured in the February 2012 DialAFlight magazine. All information was correct at time of going to print.

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