Hulhule Island Hotel — Hotel in Malé

After seeing all the wonderful reviews about the pool bar, we decided to spend the end of our holiday whilst waiting for airport check-in at this bar. I had previously emailed the hotel to ask if we could sit by the pool maybe use the pool and have some thing to eat for a couple of hours before our check-in at the airport opened. I received a lovely email back saying they would be delighted for us to come and use the pool bar. So we did.||We were picked up as promised by the shuttle, which was really the reason why this rating had a 2 not a 0. The kuoni rep also arranged for us to have a shuttle back to the airport at 8:30 pm. ||The shuttle is great, and we were advised by the kuoni rep that it is a little bit too far to walk in the heat .||On arrival, we were warmed welcomely by the lovely man on reception. From reception down a corridor to the pool bar is literally a 20 sec walk (just pointing this out now because it becomes obviously later why I have said this).||We got to the pool got ourselves a couple of beds and just walked to the bar which is at the end of the pool. We ordered a drink. I’m quite a bubbly character so I made a joke with the barman that the reviews were excellent about him so we felt like we could not possibly come and experience it. He looked at me deadpan . We got our drinks and went to a table by the pool to have our food. Food was good not brilliant, but can’t complain. I don’t wanna bore you with all the details but it was one of the most uncomfortable lunches I’ve ever had. The little grey cat that’s been mentioned by another reviewer came to us really skinny and scratching at my leg for food. I am an animal lover admittedly so there was no way I wasn’t going to give this little kitty some of my daughter’s chicken burger. The cat was lovely not a pest but following this we were treated like absolute vermin. The bar staff kept looking over to us and obviously talking about it. My daughter felt like she was being stared at constantly we decided to try and ignore it and got up to go back to our sunbed. We were quickly intercepted and told that we could not sit on the sunbed. I asked why not and was told we do not have a pool package. I explained that we were told that we could just sit by the pool. There was no way they were going to let us sit on one of the 90% unoccupied sunbeds. . We were pretty tired as we had left our island at 3 o’clock and it was now coming up to 6 o’clock with another three hours to go before check-in.||I took a photo of the lovely view from where we were sitting whilst eating you can see the sun beds are literally a stones throw away. We noticed that the champs bar seating looked more comfy so I asked if we could move to the bar. I was given a very stony face answer of yes as we walked away with our drinks we were completely stared out.||We sat in the champ bar for about an hour and a half. There is absolutely nothing great about this bar although it was comfy with a nice view there are a lot of local men there. I found this quite nice as it felt very local and not so touristy. Cut this to the big finale.||We decided to leave early as it hasn’t been the best experience trying to leave the bar once again we were intercepted by a member of security bearing in mind to turn right back to reception was a 20walk we were told that we could not do go this way I told him that we had a taxi shuttle booked at reception, but he refused to let us walk that way. He took us to the door to go out to the pool and pointed to a gap at the far end which we had to go through instead, this took us through rough gardens. This has been described by another reviewer as well. We came out at a big wire fence. it was all a little bit.ghetto and we did not feel very comfortable. Eventually we came out onto the road and simply turned right and walked all the way back down and straight into reception where I told them how rude we had been treated. I told them that we weren’t allowed to do the walk from the bar just down the corridor we had to go all the way around the exterior of the hotel and back onto the main road at this point I had just about experienced enough so we just got our shuttle and left. Again the man on reception was extremely apologetic and asked if we wanted to complain to the manager. To be quite frank I could not be arsed but he was extremely nice . Unbelievably terrible experience I do not understand why it is given such great ratings unless only the boys are welcome and not two good...

Situated next to the airport so it can be a little noisy but fortunately the flights stop late night. The hotel itself is on the waters edge and most rooms look out to the beach and sea. Some however on the sides do look out onto some not so nice views. For security and privacy I wound not recommend the ground floor rooms but the ones facing the beach do provide direct access from your room terrace to the sand.

The beds are comfortable and two pillows provided. There is no top sheet but a simple comforter, which can get very annoyingly hot.

The air conditioner has two speeds, low and high, and both are quite noisy. The OFF speed is very quiet though.

There is a nice pool operating 10am-10pm. There is a bar and tables for snacks in the area as well as sun lounger chairs.

The beach area is small but the clean white sand and the protected water makes it ideal for children. Overlooking the water is a sandy level area with sun lounge chairs and umbrella.

There is a small gym for basic workouts from 7am to 10pm and a gym instructor available between 7am to midday and 4pm to 10pm.

The Sports bar is popular at night and the various restaurants provide a variety of food choices.

The main restaurant holds theme nights include Mexican and seafood.

Food and beverages are on the pricy side of expensive but then again so is the whole country. For some relief you can try the food court and eating places at the terminal.

There is a complementary shuttle bus that takes you to the terminal, which is handy if you have baggage or if it is raining. Otherwise it's a short 5 minute walk through an interesting sea port area.

Overall it's a handy place for a short term stay but with all the many splendid resort islands to choose from, you would not stay at this hotel for your entire vacation.

Update Nov 2018. They have made some minor improvements to be rooms and a general fresh coat of paint so it's looking quite good. They use individual hot water heaters in the rooms so if you are not getting any hot water check the switch labeled water heater 20A on the wall next to...

VERY VERY DANGEROUS PLACE ! Please all be careful and better avoid to go there! First of all the most awful service in Maldives with uneducated Indian waiters who cheat with the bills and money! Especially waiter KUMAR! We ordered a bottle of wine and after we finished it we paid and left! Then after 15 min we were walking across the place again and suddenly another waiter stopped us and said we didn't pay anything! Then their Supervisor came and F&B manager KK who was very very rude and very unprofessional and didn't solve the problem, he just said sorry it was not posted and u have to pay twice! We were shocked! The F&B manager doesn't know what is going in his place and moreover he was so rude to us that we thought he would start to hit and fight! As per him cameras and system showed we didn't pay! It's a magic how professionally that waiter KUMAR cheated! Later we found the way how he did it: : these waiters collect the old bills from previous guests (which usually people never take) and then they save it - later when there is a another customer comes with the same common bill amount - waiter just presents already existing old bill and customer pays it! That's how their waiters avoid to put it to the system and just takes the money! There is a great MAFIA working in that place without any service and any professionalism! We have been so many places in Maldives but this is the most hobble and dangerous one! Dear GM, please kindly look at this matter which happens...