Reethi Faru Resort

Our 3rd trip to the Maldives and we chose Reethi Faru based on: Vegan food options Budget (one of the lower cost resorts) All inclusive option Distance from Male - not too close (as to spoil the desert island experience), and not so far for easy transfer 1. Seaplane Transfer Approx. 45 minute seaplane transfer, as stated on Reethi Faru's website, although we stopped at other resorts on both outbound and inbound transfers, which resulted in almost 1.5 hrs on the seaplane. Best not to be too optimistic about seaplane transfer timings of course. Worth noting that the TMA terminal is much improved since our previous visit. 2. Welcome Thanks fully nice and brief, although I do wish they would defer the explanations of all the resort's facilities until a little later. 3. Dining There are various places to eat, surprising so for a relatively small resort. Many are open only for dinner, so your choices for breakfast and lunch are limited to the Vakaru buffer and Dhiyavaru 'over-water' restaurant. The latter is open 24/7, although that's not well promoted, and we didn't realise that until a few days into our stay. Reservations are recommended 2 days in advance, although we didn't always do so and never had any trouble, probably because the resort occupancy was quite low during our stay. The Vakaru buffet is good, although certainly not the most extensive, there were many different dishes on offer each day, in addition to the usual salad bar etc. Vegan options were clearly marked, as were dishes with lactose. That's a tiny feature that makes the buffet experience much easier for vegans, in that respect, this buffet was the best (most clear info) that we have ever seen. The Vegan / Vegetarian restaurant is open only for dinner, and is located on the edge of the beach, with private tables, offering a very special dining experience. They only have 4 tables, so definitely book in advance if you are vegan (although vegan options are available in all the restaurants). The vegan options were delicious and relatively healthy, we were glad to see no fake 'meat' for example, just good old plants, nuts, seeds & legumes. The lentil Bolognese was delicious! We didn't eat at the Reethi Grill, although it has vegan options, its more focussed on meat & fish, as you might expect from the name. Ditto the Veyo poolside snack bar, which is so close to the Dhiyavaru, hence best just to go there. The Dhiyavaru 'over-water' restaurant was one of our favourite dining venues, despite the limited vegan options. The menu is a sort of 'Asian fusion' style, which isn't our cup of tea, but they were happy to serve dishes from the other restaurants by prior request. In general, this resort caters well for vegans, and goes out of its way to do so. Other resorts also cater for vegans, but almost by accident, if you know what I mean. Rarely did we see vegetables served in butter for example, and ditto with the salad bar. 4. All Inclusive We had the 'dine around' all inclusive, which they also refer to as 'premium' on the resort, which allowed us to dine in any of the restaurants and pretty much unlimited menu choices (the vegan options at least). The wine list is also pretty good, maybe 6 red wine options within the AI package and other options at a modest extra cost. I have to say that I didn't enjoy the wine so much, possibly because of the temperature and maybe it wasn't appropriately stored, I cant be sure. Could even be my taste buds, as I often find this in hot climates, the red wine has a lightly 'cooked' taste. Many of the classic cocktails are not in the AI package, but the bar staff are always willing to make something unique and we enjoyed trying their surprise options. The AI also includes a basic SCUBA session, but we didn't take advantage of that. 5. Accomodation We stayed in a water villa, which was nice, although showing signs of its age just a little bit. Nothing that would spoil our holiday, for example, temperamental (broken) shower taps, broken torch and water deck looking a little tired. Can't complain at this budget. TIP: well worth taking a good torch, helpful for walking on the beach at night and also great for watching the sea life in the dark. 6. Sealife / Snorkelling The resort has a reef almost all the way around the perimeter of the island, and hence plenty of sea life to see close to the beach, great for snorkelling. We saw very small sharks, the occasional ray and every shape, size and colour of tropical fish you could imagine. Wed did a 1hr jet ski trip to see the doplhins and were lucky enough to witness around 400 dolphins playing (jumping) all around us in the ocean, highly recommended (by boat or jet ski). Even just walking down the beach, or along the boardwalks, you will see plenty of fish and sharks etc. 7. The Island in General Reethi Faru is a medium sized island, certainly far from the smallest of Maldivian resorts and also not so big. You can walk the circumference of the island on the beach in around 30 minutes. Inland is the usual vegetation, which is quite well kept, but definitely a little untidy in places. The 'engine rooms' of the resorts operations (staff quarters, generators, water treatment etc.) are not particularly well hidden either. We avoided walking inland, preferring the beach routes instead. Again, some parts of the beach are a little 'untidy', particularly where they have used sand bags to retain the sand in place, understandably so, but it does rather spoil the desert island paradise image. Also, many of the sand bags are covered in black scum (mould?), which looks pretty unappealing and can be treacherous to walk on (i.e. slippery). As we walked around mostly by the beach, it was unavoidable to walk on the sand bags in certain locations. Also, some of the beach villas back out onto the beach via said sand bags, with which we wouldn't have been too impressed. Again, this didn't spoil our holiday and cant really complain for this price, but if I were in charge of this resort, I would be looking to improve that, and at the very least up their game on the maintenance and cleaning of those sand bags. 8. Service All the staff were friendly and helpful, as you would expect for a Maldivian resort. Housekeeping left a little to be desired, but nothing to grumble about, just not very on the ball at times. For example, we had breakfast in our room one day and the plates etc. were still there at the end of the day, despite that fact that we were out most of the day and placed the 'clean our room' sign on the door. Would we return? Yes, absolutely! For Vegans particularly, look no further, after extensive research, this resort is way ahead of any other that we have seen, certainly at this budget.

This resort is truly magical. We both had a wonderful time. The food was amazing, plenty of choices and a different theme every day, its difficult to choose a favourite tho I think the Japanese and Sri Lankan evenings were exceptional, thank you to Musa for looking after us so well, and all the different chefs who work so hard. Our room was over the water and was wonderful, I loved the outdoor shower, Rachid looked after us and decorated the room for our arrival and when it was my husband’s birthday. The staff went out of their way to help us celebrate, we had a wonderful meal on the beach. It was also nice to meet Thomas who came to make sure we had enjoyed our meal and had everything we wanted. There are tea and coffee facilities in the room , bottles of water and a fridge, there is no mini bar but you are able to get cans from the bars around the island and take them back to the room, and store them in the fridge. My husband enjoyed a package of snorkelling trips organised by the dive centre, and he also went on the island morning snorkelling trip to be shown the best places to see the house reef. We both loved the sunset cruise, and there is a lovely sunset bar to watch the sun going down. The only negative I can think of and its very slight, we weren’t met at the airport on arrival, and had to wander around looking, in the end we just asked another rep who had to call ours. Upon departure as we were the only guests leaving from our resort again we didn’t see a rep so we’re unsure which bus to get on and where our luggage was but Tbf there are plenty of people at the airport to ask, but maybe some written instructions from reception on departure as to what to expect might be useful Thank you for a truly wonderful holiday

This is an amazing resort in a very beautiful location. The staff are incredible and all go out of their way to make your stay as enjoyable as possible. The resort and rooms are kept in an immaculate condition. This was our honeymoon and the resort gave us an amazing private dining experience on the beach. The restaurant provided lovely food for all meals. The buffet dinner had a different theme every night with loads of options available. I have a dietary requirement and the staff went out of their way to make sure I was looked after in this regard. There are lots of water based activities available but plenty of places to enjoy the sunshine.

We have just returned from the most amazing holiday at Reethi Faru, this was our first visit to the Maldives and this resort far exceeded our expectations. We will certainly return. The team at Reethi Faru were exceptional in their level of service, friendly, warm, professional and within two days they all knew and remembered our room number and name. When walking around the resort team members would stop their conversation when we were walking past and ensure to greet us and enquire about our day. Although we were all inclusive we decided to dine at Reethi Grill on two nights for an additional charge, well worth it, the food was excellent and the surroundings were breathtaking. We appreciated both the chef Somash, and the Manager Thomas coming out to speak with us. We also had excellent and attentive service from our waiter in Reethi Grill (I wish I could recall his name). The all inclusive buffet was an excellent standard daily and the team were very efficient. One evening we were joined for a drink by the resort executive chef Ashis, he took time to speak with us and discuss his time at the resort which was lovely. Most nights we went to the Haruge bar, the team here were really attentive, and a lot of fun, the perfect end to the day. During the day we spent time at the pool, enjoying boat trips and visiting some of the other bars, we also visited the spa, the consistent standard of friendly service in each area is to be commended. A great sales man in the Jewellery store at the resort too!!! Overall the accommodation was excellent, the beaches magnificent, wonderful food and a great variety of activities and amenities however for us the warm friendly team is what made this a trip to remember. Thank you Reethi Faru Team!!!

We went to reethi faru for our 5th anniversary. We did debate shall we go back to our honeymoon island but I'm so pleased we chose reethi faru because our honeymoon memories should be cherished. Reethi faru completely delivered what we wanted which was great snorkeling, a beautiful deluxe beach bungalow, gorgeous food and complete chill and relax vibes. I had a full body massage in the spa which was fab. We did the manta lagoon and saw 13 mantas ! We did turtle reef on our anniversary and saw 6 turtles! In the house reef we saw turtles, octopus, sharks, a huge sting ray and plenty of colourful fish. I absolutely loved our deluxe beach bungalow, offering privacy on the beach and chilling on the terrace at night with a night cap. The staff are absolutely wonderful and can't do enough for you. The food is simply gorgeous, please do the full inclusive package as you can eat in all the restaurants, our fav was the grill. Lunchtime pizzas are a must there. We enjoyed daily cocktails from 11am at the beach bars and spent our days chilling and snorkeling, which to us is heaven. I turned my personal phone off and left the work phone in the UK and I can't recommend that enough, just go and enjoy the beautiful island, if you are looking to cut off and relax this is the place to do it - I felt completely and utterly relaxed and I haven't felt like that in such a long time. We would definitely go back to reethi faru - get booking! They also gave us a treat for our anniversary which was dinner in their top restaurant on the beach which isn't included in the inclusive package, so we felt truly spoilt by the team.