Maldives Review
Lots of people know the Maldives is an expensive destination. But not so many are aware that it could be a budget destination if you chose your hotel and route carefully.
Back when the husband and I were young together (before the kids came along haha), we saw this photo of an oversized bath tub in a villa in a dream ocean. And ever since then we'd put Maldives on our dream destinations list.
Owing to budget, it stayed in our dreams for a LONG time.
Happily due to all that airline competition, we got a budget flight from Singapore to Maldives for SGD900 for the 4 of us on Tiger Air. I should mention it's the nett return price. AND I'm so thankful we waited so long to get there, because in 2009 the Maldivian government decided to open the inhabited islands to tourists and allow locals to operate their own guesthouses. AND we found the perfect inn which just happened to open up this year in time for our dream holiday: Gunbaru Inn on Ukulhas Island. This is a locally-run guesthouse on an inhabited island about a 4 hour boat ride away from Male city. Read my review here.
The Argument for Local Guesthouses
If your idea of the Real Maldives, as was ours, is the image of the overwater villa in a tranquil turquoise sea, why waste your time going to stay someplace else?
Well, firstly the local guesthouses are WAY cheaper than staying at the private resorts. Easily more than ten times.
Secondly and this was an important point to us, transportation to and from the private resorts could cost more than a night's stay there depending on the number of people in your group. I kid you not.
Thirdly, the sea's the same.
So, our plan was to do a combo local and private resort stay to lower the cost yet allow us a chance to stay in a water villa. Here's our route, and you'll see why it made cents to us to do it this way: Airport-Male-Ukulhas-Nika-Airport.
Malé
We needed to get to Male, because the public ferry to Ukulhas departs at 9am Tuesday from Male. Public ferries to various islands don't run daily, so when you are planning your trip, you need to decide which island you want to go to, and check the ferry schedule. Our flight arrived at 12 pm on Sunday. So we had a 2 night lay-over in the capital. Which suited us fine because we were curious to see it. We chose to stay at Skai Lodge and you can see my review here.
Ukulhas (pronounced Oo-kul-haas)
Ukulhas island is a local, inhabited island of about 1000 people.
By going first to a local island, we were able to take the public MTCC ferry there (as opposed to a sea plane or speedboat to a private resort). The ferry price is cheap - no more than a couple of US dollars depending on where you're going. Gunbaru Inn paid for our ferry ride, so it cost us nothing. In contrast, if we had gone straight from the airport to Nika Island, the one-way sea plane ticket is USD212.50 per adult and USD106.25 per child. That would work out to be USD1275 for the four of us return. (The bed and breakfast price for a Nika water villa was USD815.84.)
Furthermore, Waheed from Gunbaru was very responsive and helpful. He arranged for us to take our own speedboat to Nika island from Ukulhas, which cut the transport cost further, because it cost only USD65 (per boat, not per head) to get from Ukulhas to Nika.
Nika Island
Nika is a private island on which sits the Nika Island Resort. 3 nights in this resort cost us more than our airfare + 2 nights in Skai + 5 nights in Gunbaru, not joking. I will post a review of Nika as soon as I can.
In summary, to give you an idea of cost differential, here's what we spent on each component of our trip:
Singapore-Maldives return airfare for 4 people: SGD900 (USD719)
2 nights in Skai Lodge (bed only): USD201
5 nights in Gunbaru Inn (bed and breakfast): USD275
Speedboat from Ukulhas to Nika: USD65
3 nights in Nika Resort (bed and breakfast): USD2447
Sea plane from Nika to airport: USD638
Back when the husband and I were young together (before the kids came along haha), we saw this photo of an oversized bath tub in a villa in a dream ocean. And ever since then we'd put Maldives on our dream destinations list.
Owing to budget, it stayed in our dreams for a LONG time.
Happily due to all that airline competition, we got a budget flight from Singapore to Maldives for SGD900 for the 4 of us on Tiger Air. I should mention it's the nett return price. AND I'm so thankful we waited so long to get there, because in 2009 the Maldivian government decided to open the inhabited islands to tourists and allow locals to operate their own guesthouses. AND we found the perfect inn which just happened to open up this year in time for our dream holiday: Gunbaru Inn on Ukulhas Island. This is a locally-run guesthouse on an inhabited island about a 4 hour boat ride away from Male city. Read my review here.
The Argument for Local Guesthouses
If your idea of the Real Maldives, as was ours, is the image of the overwater villa in a tranquil turquoise sea, why waste your time going to stay someplace else?
Well, firstly the local guesthouses are WAY cheaper than staying at the private resorts. Easily more than ten times.
Secondly and this was an important point to us, transportation to and from the private resorts could cost more than a night's stay there depending on the number of people in your group. I kid you not.
Thirdly, the sea's the same.
So, our plan was to do a combo local and private resort stay to lower the cost yet allow us a chance to stay in a water villa. Here's our route, and you'll see why it made cents to us to do it this way: Airport-Male-Ukulhas-Nika-Airport.
Malé
We needed to get to Male, because the public ferry to Ukulhas departs at 9am Tuesday from Male. Public ferries to various islands don't run daily, so when you are planning your trip, you need to decide which island you want to go to, and check the ferry schedule. Our flight arrived at 12 pm on Sunday. So we had a 2 night lay-over in the capital. Which suited us fine because we were curious to see it. We chose to stay at Skai Lodge and you can see my review here.
Ukulhas (pronounced Oo-kul-haas)
Ukulhas island is a local, inhabited island of about 1000 people.
By going first to a local island, we were able to take the public MTCC ferry there (as opposed to a sea plane or speedboat to a private resort). The ferry price is cheap - no more than a couple of US dollars depending on where you're going. Gunbaru Inn paid for our ferry ride, so it cost us nothing. In contrast, if we had gone straight from the airport to Nika Island, the one-way sea plane ticket is USD212.50 per adult and USD106.25 per child. That would work out to be USD1275 for the four of us return. (The bed and breakfast price for a Nika water villa was USD815.84.)
Furthermore, Waheed from Gunbaru was very responsive and helpful. He arranged for us to take our own speedboat to Nika island from Ukulhas, which cut the transport cost further, because it cost only USD65 (per boat, not per head) to get from Ukulhas to Nika.
Nika Island
Nika is a private island on which sits the Nika Island Resort. 3 nights in this resort cost us more than our airfare + 2 nights in Skai + 5 nights in Gunbaru, not joking. I will post a review of Nika as soon as I can.
In summary, to give you an idea of cost differential, here's what we spent on each component of our trip:
Singapore-Maldives return airfare for 4 people: SGD900 (USD719)
2 nights in Skai Lodge (bed only): USD201
5 nights in Gunbaru Inn (bed and breakfast): USD275
Speedboat from Ukulhas to Nika: USD65
3 nights in Nika Resort (bed and breakfast): USD2447
Sea plane from Nika to airport: USD638
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