How the times have changed...

...Easter in the UK

The 4 day weekend was upon us - and even although we we've only back from honeymoon a few weeks - the extra weekend days were very much needed!

Mark started Friday morning off fairly early with his first 'fly fishing' excursion with Nev and caught his first fish -a Trout (well apart from when he was a child). The release of it however sounded a bit more difficult than the actual catch...with the poor thing getting a bit dazed on confused on its return to the water. But I believe it's safe to say it survived the experience and eventually swam off carefree!

Jenna and I decided on a little bit of a later start to the morning and headed off for a bike ride in Wimbledon Comman and Richmond Park. Two flat tyres and some pumping action later we could finally leave the house for the mammoth task of the biggest hill in Raynes Park (and that's before we can even get to the Common/Park)! The ride was very pleasant and the weather managed to hold out for us, yet it was still rather muddy from all the rain we had had during the week and some of us (aka me) managed to get far more full of mud than others (aka Jenna, who actually managed to stay pretty much mud free until a dog jumped up at her with muddy paws!).

That evening all 4 of us made the trip down to Henley upon Thames for a lovely dinner with Mel and Bruce (and Isabelle - change 1), and Ang and Denham (and Harper - change 4).

Since we in the lovely Spring season, Saturday was spent 'Spring Cleaning' the house - something that we had been meaning to do for ages, but never got round to doing -and now would be just in time for the first braai of the season at our place on Easter Sunday.

Unfortunately the rain graced us with its presence on and off throughout the day on Easter Sunday, but that didn't stop the inevitable braai from happening and from us getting this photo which very nicely captures just 'how the times have changed'...

It was great to be surrounded by 'little ones' again for Easter, as we usually seem to be back in SA with my nieces. I still think of them, Tayla and Chesney, as very young (now aged 5 and 7), but clearly they are actually getting quite big (translation I am getting quite old), and therefore my excitement of an Easter Egg hunt this year may have been a little premature!

Nevermind... even although there wasn't an egg hunt as such, the 'parents' managed to do just as well polishing off the Easter Bunny's presents.

The Moms: Hollie with Gabriel (change 5 - 1 week), Jules with Travis (change 3 - 4 months) and Ang with Harper (change 4 - 8 weeks)

Absent: Mel with Isabelle (change 1 - 1 year) and Hayley with Tyler (change 2 - 10 months)

Take me down to Paradise city....

Where the sand is white and it's oh so pretty!

We arrived in Male, the capital city of the Maldives, after an hour or so flight from Sri Lanka, and made our way to the Trans-Maldivian Air counter, our seaplane company who would be getting us to the Kuredu Island. We boarded our 12 seater plane and were on our way to arguably one of the most spectacular places in the world.

The view from the plane was fantastic with the assortments of blues and turquoises. We flew over numerous islands and I snapped away, taking advantage of sitting at the window, and the fact that we happened to be right in front of the plane, behind the pilots. 45min or so later we landed in paradise! We were taken to one of the bars on the island, before getting a taxi to what would become our home for the next week. We were staying in the Sangu Water Villas, and once at the Sangu reception we were met by our Island host Fikery, who gave us some forms to sign, before escorting us to our room. Amazing! The water villas are on stilts in the sea and we had our own deck (x2) as well as our own entry point into the sea.

While we were waiting for our luggage to arrive in our room we went to explore a bit of the island and once our luggage had arrived we soon changed and were off to the Sangu Bar to meet with Fikery who explained how everything worked and gave us a map of the island. The Island was 1.5km long and we were at the one end, our main bar and restaurant would be the beautiful Sangu Bar and Restaurant however you could make use of any of the other ala carte restaurants on the island if we so wished. We soon learnt that Sangu was actually the best! After Fikery left us, we continued to enjoy some sundowners on the bar deck and watched an amazing sunset before heading off to the Restaurant for dinner.

The food....
We were greeted with an amazing assortment of food - breakfast, lunch and supper was all inclusive and were all extravagent buffets (heaven help the waistline)... Each night was a different food night (i.e. Seafood, French, Sri Lankan, BBQ, Continental etc etc). There was always a salad table, condiment table, hors d'oeuvres, homemade breads, Sri Lankan currys, mains, mains made on the spot – either fresh fish, meat, pasta etc depending on the night, a dessert table, a fruit table and finally a cheese table!!! AMAZING!! We had our own waiter, Rattay, who was very attentive in making sure our water and drinks were constantly filled. The first night after dinner we decided to walk along the beach to the central entertainment area, where they had a large bar and where there would be a different type entertainment each night (live bands, DJs, underwater movies you name it!).

Experience the Maldives...
The next day, after a monstrous breakfast, we headed to the dive centre to find out more about the dives and to get some fins for snorkelling. We booked ourselves into the orientation dive (for those who haven’t dived in the Maldives before) for the next day and then headed off for our first dip in the sea. We were not disappointed the water was crystal clear and the fish were quite inquisitive. I think Mark was in the water about 2 minutes before he got out to fetch his snorkelling gear. I followed suit for my first ever proper snorkelling experience (I don’t know what I was doing in Egypt, as it was definitely not the same). We went far out (again a first for me), but the water was so calm it didn’t really matter. The fish life was beautiful! After about an hour I decided it was time to head back to shore, weary of a one sided tan, but Mark continued...so I splashed around in near the shore. When Mark eventually tired out, we headed to the hotel pool for yet another bath.

Relax, eat, drink, swim, snorkel, dive, REPEAT...

The next few days consisted pretty much of relaxing, eating, drinking, swimming, snorkelling and the occasional scuba dive.

We did our orientation dive the next day at one of the 47 dive sites the island had to offer, which was Kuredu’s house reef. We jumped in from the pier (a first for me with a proper ‘big-step’ entry in diving) and I managed to descend first time, without panicking and heading back to the surface (again a first – having my own mask made all the difference). We had to do 2 skills, flooding the mask and the buddy breathing for an emergency accent before we could head off on the dive, and for once it wasn’t me having the trouble staying down! When we had all done the skills we headed off to explore the house reef which had a boat wreck from the surface down to about 18m. AWESOME!

The next day we just chilled...apart from signing up for our next dive for the following day, we just swam, snorkelled, ate and relaxed. My snorkelling experience this time was a bit short lived when I saw the hugest stingray swim (or whatever it is that stinrays do) come between Mark and I...I shouted to get Marks attention, after which he happily swam towards it. I on the otherhand swam as quickly as I could to get away from it and back to shore. Then whilst on the shore, feet deep in water I spotted some...AHEM...black tip sand sharks. Whilst they were only small, I again, the noenie that I am, got out of the water rather promptly. Later that day we made use of our complementary 'couples massage' voucher we had been given and in the evening we went on our complimentary 'sunset cruise'. The sunset for the cruise was really amazing and to top things off, we had some very friendly dolphins frolicking about in front of the boat. Another great day!

The next morning was an early start, a minimal breakfast (although still bigger than any breakfast we would have had in London) we headed to the dive centre to get our kit ready for the boat dive. Once on board the dive guides explained which reef we would be going to and what we needed to do, by drawing us a chalkboard picture. Another tick for me, as it was my first boat dive and ‘big step' entry this time from a boat. Once in the water we were instructed to go down straight away, which I wasn't quite prepared for, thinking I would have time to de-fog my mask...but not wanting to be left behind I landed up with a very foggy mask for most of the dive, being too scared to actually flood my own mask whilst on the dive. Back on board the boat, we met a South African couple from PE, who were very keen divers and who were on their second visit to the exact same island in the Maldives. Then when everyone was back onboard, all having completed the dive, we headed back to the island where we signed up for our next dive, with a day’s rest in between.

The next day the sky was not quite as blue as it had been the day before, and we experienced our first bit of rain in the Maldives...it wasn’t much and probably lasted all of 2 minutes and before long it was all clear again and we enjoyed another day of complete relaxation. BLISS!!

Our 3rd dive was also a morning one and Mark decided he would put his name down for a 2nd dive that afternoon. This time however the sky was a bit grey and as soon as we were on the boat the rain came bucketing down. The sea already quite choppy, with big swells got even worse and typically enough we were on what was going to the longest boat ride yet (I’m feeling like I’m still bobbing up and down just thinking back and writing this)...45 min later we had arrived at the reef we were going to dive. The guides picture of the reef this time was a bit more daunting... to add to the miserable weather, he explained how we needed to make sure we were right with the current so we didn’t land up out in the channel, which would make for an unpleasant and exhausting dive, and to add to it he had drawn a nice little picture of a shark (my nerves)! One of the guides went down to check the current and whilst he was doing this, the first of the divers onboard gave in to seasickness...by the time the guide came up to tell us about the current (which thankfully was on our side, as it was only mild) 3 people confirmed that they would not be diving, as they were too seasick. The struggle in my head to either stay on the boat and potentially be seasick and stuck out there for an hour, against actually doing the dive was a big one...and eventually the decision to dive won! Once down there, the difference was incredible and you would never have guessed what was going on, on the surface. However having psyched myself out a bit too much on the surface, I was rather tense (and absolutely guzzled my air), which didn’t make for the most enjoyable dive. We went down to about 25m straight away and were surrounded by blue, blue, blue...and couldn’t see too much else, so I stayed close to the guide as we swam towards the reef. The dive was unfortunately quite uneventful, apart from right near the end when we saw 2 spotted eagles rays just gliding through the water (don’t ask me why, but it’s a complete different feeling seeing a ray on a dive than to while you snorkelling), and a school of barracuda – but no sharks (much to my relief and Mark’s dismay). Back on the surface the others were still sick, and 2 of the guys who had done the dive landed up getting sick too on the way back to the island. I was very pleased to get back to shore, seasick free and another notch in my diving belt. Mark decided against the second dive of the day and instead we lazed around by the pool, in between the rain and the sun.

The next day was our last full day and we completely just chilled! The weather was perfect - we ventured to the complete opposite side of the island where the 'O resort' was and dined, swam and relaxed there. The stingrays (big and small) were out in full force, and so were the black tip sand sharks...but that didn't stop us from enjoying our last snorkel and swim. That evening we enjoyed a brilliant live band, on what was our last night at the Sangu Bar which was the perfect end to a perfect and unforgetable honeymoon!