The Westin Maldives Miriandhoo Resort — Hotel in South Maalhosmadulu

The PERFECT Honeymoon

When researching potential hotels for our honeymoon in the Maldives, we started creating an Excel Sheet overview and rated 20+ hotels along different categories. The winner for us was The Westin Maldives Miriandhoo Resort. On paper the following points convinced us: Amazing house reef w/ very diverse marine life; Amazing villas & Dive Center on the Island.

It was the first time for us to visit the Maldives and since it was our honeymoon (10 days), we had high expectations. To make it short: Our expectations were exceeded in a way that will be hard to describe by words. It was the PERFECT Honeymoon.

To dive a little deeper: The Westin fulfills ALL the expectations that one has towards a hotel of that class: AMAZING nature (the house reef is incredible and we spotted sharks, rays and countless fishes), INCREDIBLE FOOD (we had 2-3 horse breakfast every morning and enjoyed the BEST breakfast of our lives including the best breakfast eggs one could wish for) and an extremely Luxurious resort (Amazing villas with incredible details, such as a private pool and open air shower).

All of the above mentioned would have made our stay a 10 out of. But there is one more factor that made this stay unforgettable: The kindness, generosity, talent and continuous extra mile of the ENTIRE team. And we really mean the ENTIRE team. Every person that works in this hotel has just one goal: Anticipate your wishes and try to fulfill them before you even know you had this wish. We have never before in our life experienced such a level of hospitality.

In the following, we want to thank some people especially, but we always include the entire team:

Jorge: Jorge and his entire team work relentlessly to fulfill every culinary dream. The food is outstanding and no matter which requests you have, they will make it possible!

Deepak: Deepak and his team work relentlessly to ensure all the logistics of food and beverages. Besides the incredible job the entire team is doing (and ensuring that there is never a lack of anything on the island), I remember sitting at breakfast on our first day, when some sun rays were hitting my eye and Deepak came running to our table to hand me his sunglasses. This is just an example of the outstanding work he and his team is doing.

Laurent: Laurent is a phenomenom. While he is wearing a dozen hats at the same time, as he is the hotel manager, he always has time for a little chat and never feels stressed. He does an amazing job to align all the different departments from the hotel to ensure an extremely holistic experience.

Sofie: Sofie was the first one to welcome us on the island and to show us around. She made sure that from the beginning every wish we had was fulfilled.

Taath: Taath makes sure with his positive attitude that all the employees are happy and have a home away from their home. He enables every other employee to go the extra mile and has some of the most amazing drum skills I have ever seen.

Shakyl: Shakyl and his housekeeping team work relentlessly to ensure that every single guest has the best villa experience possible. Never in my life have we experienced such an attention to detail and so much love and kindness from this entire team. Housekeeping falls short in describing what his team is doing. They are artists.

Anton: The service level in all of the three restaurants is amazing. One person who really stood out is Anton, as he was fulfilling our wishes before we even knew we had them. Thank you so much!

Fikree: Last but not least: Fikree. Fikree is one of the most outstanding people we got to know. He is not only extremely helpful, polite, curious and funny, but he made us feel at home thanks to his incredible kindness and hospitality. He treats every guest with the greatest respect, makes everyone laugh and is always available to solve any issue that a guest might have. Thank you so much for making this stay very special, Fikree

Thank you so much to every single person on this island for making this the most special Honeymoon we could have wished...

I have been an SPG member for a couple of decades and when I heard about the opening of the Westin Maldives I was really excited to stay there. My expectations were high especially when you are spending $3k a night for a room (two adults and two children including f&b and seaplane). However, the hotel didn't live up to the expectations but the issues are all fixable.

What was great? The island is spectacularly beautiful and easy to get around. The reef is well maintained and the fish you can see at the reef drop-off is amazing. I saw a lot of reef sharks, schools of thousands of fish, tuna, etc. Great dive center run by an amazing woman running it. They know what they are doing, are well organized, and are flexible. The rooms are new, well built, and well furnished. The outdoor shower was excellent. Many of the staff members are amazing. Irish was friendly, attentive and a superstar at the restaurant. Nawal always seated us with a smile, Hussain always made us smile at our meals. Jaime organized evening football which was amazing. Th bartender, Anto, made us some amazing cocktails. The fitness center is new with good equipment.

What could be improved? This is the first time I have stayed at a resort and not met the GM even once. I was surprised by this but when I spoke to the other guests I realized that none of them had met the GM either. When I asked about this they said that he likes to stay in his office. On checkout I was told that he would stop by to say hi when we were leaving - however, he didn't show up. I believe the GM staying in his office, rather than being the face of the hotel, is the source of many of the problems. A lot of the staff were not happy with the hotel and you could feel it. As I got to know them, they would voice their grievances and you felt so bad for them. You got the sensation that the hotel is about wellness but has ignored the wellness of their own employees. The team is short-staffed and this shows up in many places. Meals often took over 45minutes to arrive. There were usually errors in the orders which you felt bad to point out as they were all working really hard. The rooms didn't get cleaned until late in the day. A couple of times it didn't get cleaned until night time. Usually, when hotels are short-staffed, the GM helps out and this helps make him/her aware of the problems and so they can get fixed quickly. One design problem for the hotel is that if you don't stay at the sunrise villas then you will not be able to see the sunrise as the villas block your view. This is the first island I have stayed at in the Maldives where they don't have a spot on the beach for you to enjoy the sunrise. Also, the sunrise yoga sessions are in a sad spot and you can't see the sunrise from there. Things are priced really high and you get the feeling that they are gouging their customers because they can. $600 for dinner at Pearl for our family of four or $200 for a covid test seem high relative to the other resorts. Some charges didn't make sense. When we made the reservation with central reservations they told us that there is a charge for the second child in the room but that since I have been a loyal member for 20 years they would ask the hotel to waive it. However, the hotel reservations said they would not waive it. They then sent me a note that we would be charged $200 per night for having a second child in the room. The $200 was including all taxes and charges. However, we were then charged $206. I asked about this and they said that it includes all taxes except for the green tax (which seems rather weird). At breakfast I asked for fresh coconut juice. I was told that there was an extra charge for this even though we had breakfast included in our package.

Overall, I think the problems can be fixed (even the sunrise issue can be fixed by converting one of the sunrise villas into a public viewing area) and the hotel can get a five star. For now, though, until these issues are fixed you can get much better value for your money at many of the...

We spent 8 nights at the Westin in early December 2019, 4 nights in a Deluxe Beach Villa and 4 nights in an Overwater Villa with Pool.

Pack a reusable water bottle, all drinking water is provided in either glasses at water coolers or (slippery when wet) glass bottles with fiddly caps. No plastic bottles are used. Request a some plastic glasses for use by your villa pool.

Like so many other Maldives visitors our TMA seaplane was repeatedly delayed, so an afternoon storm was brewing as we arrived at the Westin. The seaplane’s pilots unloaded us and our luggage onto a small pontoon, where we clung to a metal rail in its centre as it lurched up and down, hoping our luggage wouldn’t slide into the ocean. As we tried to climb onto the resort boat it kept suddenly lurching away from the pontoon, making the step across to the launch quite frightening. My husband slipped and lost his balance as he stepped onto the boat, falling heavily. The resort staff repeatedly asked him if he was okay but given how stressful that whole arrival was, a gesture of hospitality to counterbalance this poor start would have been nice. Unsurprisingly, we flew the domestic airline back to Male.

While we enjoyed the resort food overall, if you like casual South East Asian cuisine, Hawker is the best resort restaurant we have experienced. Delicious noodle dishes and Chilli Crab, sunny service, sitting on the sand. On lazy days we had Hawker’s food delivered to our villa. Thank you, Hussain for your kind hospitality!

One night, a wine distributor sponsored a special wine dinner ($US190++ per person). Ten couples participated and we had the best time, with Indonesians, Taiwanese, Japanese and Australians all sharing toasts (very generous pours meant sore heads the next day).

When strong ocean currents, swell and wind made snorkelling directly from the beach difficult, we swapped to Villa 107. We LOVED the size and sense of luxury of the overwater villa – the pool was about 3x larger than the beach villa’s (though still very shallow). Snorkelling from the overwater villa was 100x better, with dolphins and manta rays sometimes visible in the waters around us. Although the sea current was still stronger than we liked, 107 has a safer sea ladder compared to other villas. As well as mesmerising 180’ water views, the villa offered more privacy (the last day in our beach villa our relaxation had been disturbed by a noisy family arriving in the villa next to ours). That said, for some reason the overwater villa bathroom has no blinds, so an occasional speed boat, sea plane or snorkeler may get an eyeful and the bathroom gets hot in the late afternoon.

The spa is beautiful, located on an outcrop surrounded by waves, with skilful Indian and Balinese masseuses. Great gym. My husband bikes daily, and he loved the high-quality stationary bicycles networked to great bicycle rides from around the world, while I used one of the ellipticals. Beautiful views out to the water and an uncrowded, relaxed vibe.

Although we delighted in the huge variety of colourful tropical fish as we snorkelled from our villa, we found that overall the Westin’s water sports compared unfavourably to our past experiences at Baros and Gili Lankanfushi. Aside from snorkelling gear and 2 hours’ kayaking, non-motorised water sports are charged (as are motorised sports, of course). We cut short our one snorkelling excursion, due to choppy waves and cloudy water at the snorkelling location. The boat trip was short, but no life jackets offered as the boat smacked heavily against rough waves. Not sure if the full moon or monsoons caused the large swell and strong currents during our Westin stay. We certainly preferred the calmer waters of previous Maldivean holidays.

Overall, our stay was filled with daily happiness and we would return to sit on the beach at Hawker eating Chilli Crab, slip into the ocean for aquarium like snorkelling and the consistent kindness of...