Christmas Eve in the Maldives was wonderful, even if it started a bit too early. There were lots of birds making a racket outside that woke me up way too early and I noticed Raymond was not in the bed. I looked around and he wasn't in the room so I thought maybe he is out reading on the deck like last time. Nope! He was in the pool! He loved the pool, somehow even more than I do which is crazy as I love swimming! He was in the pool every chance he got. He is so silly. We started off the day with a nice breakfast by the water.
When we went back to our room they were cleaning it so we headed over to the beach to hang out for a bit. Look at all the hermit crabbie tracks!
Fruit bats!
You see lots of them flying around, but it is hard to get them in a photo as they are so quick!
We hung out at the beach for a bit, then spied on the room and they were still cleaning so we went to the bar for some beverages. Really after this morning I always brought out swimwear with us so we could swim whenever we wanted, even if they were cleaning our room!
When we got back to the room Raymond said he might go snorkeling today over on by the sandbank so I said let's go! It was really shallow over there so I was going to see about wading out with the fishes
I know it doesn't really look like it, but it was really windy and you couldn't see through the water very well and there were lots of almost invisible fishes that wouldn't swim away from me so Raymond went by himself
While I sat on the beach reading my book. They had lots of books you could borrow and I saw "The Girl in the Train" which I had been waiting for from the library forever so I grab that to read while we were there.
It was so beautiful! And not many people around
He came back shortly and said that there weren't many fish out there so we headed back to the room.
Raymond was going to spy on the reef out there and I was just going to swim. But then I thought no, why don't I try again to get in the water with the fishes. And went to walk down to the beach and saw
Sharkie! He was WAY too big for me to consider going in with him. So pool it was for me. When I saw him swim by then head out towards where Raymond was I thought should I be worried? Is Raymond in potential trouble? So I looked it up and found that the Maldives has never had a shark attack and these are just black tipped reef sharks which are not harmful to humans. So it was all good.
And I saw so many sharkies swimming by!! During high tide they just go up and down the shore in the shallow water.
Tiny baby sharks that were so cute!! So you know I don't want things like fish touching me, why I can't go snorkeling, but these guys were so cute I just wanted to pick them up and snuggle with them!! I know that is not the best idea, but still it was odd to want to snuggle with a sea creature I normally don't want anywhere near me.
So many sharks so shark patrol was born! Every morning Raymond would say what are you up to today and I would always answer "Shark Patrol!!"
Lots of big sand crabbies
Shark came back again
Raymond on his way back from the reef
After a morning of Shark Patrol swimming and snorkeling it was time for lunch at Palm. Frozen beverage for me
Amazing salad with sundried tomatoes, walnuts, and raspberry vinaigrette. This was so so tasty! Plus they grow the greens in their own greenhouses on the island.
Aglio olio - pasta with garlic and olive oil for me. When done right it is one of my favorite dishes. Delicious!
And pizza for Raymond
Afterwards we looked at the ice cream menu and decided to share the citrus sundae - lemon and lime sorbet with mint sauce and dark chocolate chips. I was a little iffy on the chocolate with the sorbet, but it was perfect!
After lunch we wandered along the beach on the other side for a bit
Though we couldn't walk the whole way back to our house on the beach. We had to cut through to the middle of the island and walk along the road
This is the main dining area on our side of the island. To the left is the bar/pool and the right is the buffet restaurant
Some of the christmas decorations
And another fruit bat!
We hung around swimming all afternoon then headed down to the buffet restaurant for a special holiday edition of afternoon tea!
Lots of cookies and treats
And green tea by the water. We went every day for high tea because why not? And this day there was one other person there, but every other time we were the only people having tea. It was like our own personal high tea
Hard to see but there is a titan triggerfish in there! He was really big and swimming around while we were drinking out tea. It was really windy over on the sunrise side of the island, which is where the restaurant was
After tea what did we do? You guessed it - went swimming!
Fruitbat flying
Raymond seeing what the water looks like with my polarized glasses
Fruit bat flying around again
Just before sunset we quickly got out of the pool and threw some clothes on to go spy on the sandbank cocktail party they were having for christmas eve.
They had a band playing and lots of people hanging out drinking cocktails
But we walked down to the point to watch the sunset
it was gorgeous!
The most people we ever saw on the sandbank
Hermit crabbie tracks
It is the perfect place to watch the sunset from
Until it went behind the low clouds again
Then back to the room until dinner
I could have stayed here forever. Seriously unbelievably beautiful!
We went to Kobe Teppanyaki for dinner. I was looking at the reservation paper (you had to reserve a space for dinner) and it said everything is cooked together so they cannot accommodate special requests so I thought hmm....we might get meat juices in our veggies or something. I only saw it right before dinner so we went and would see what happened.
We started with a cucumber salad which I love love loved! I would have gone back just to get this again
When we got there the waitress said you guys are vegan? No egg? I said correct. So she said she would tell the chef. We had ordered the tempura, but she then came back to let up know it did have egg in it so Raymond had the tempura veggies
And I had asparagus sushi. Yum!
Our chef was a lot of fun - making lots of jokes and very entertaining
He came over before he started cooking and asked about the no egg. He said did it have to be no egg no contamination at all and I said no egg is fine cause he couldn't do no contamination at all.
He cooked the egg first then put it off to the side and cleaned the grill really well before he cooked everything else. First the carrots, onion, and garlic
Then he added the rice and put some for us in our bowls, then added the egg to the rest. I really wasn't contaminated with egg at all - he cleaned everything before cooking anything else after he cooked the egg so it was fine.
After cooking the rice for everyone else he once again cleaned the grill and cooked our veggies
Mushrooms for Raymond and asparagus and zucchini for me
It was delicious!
Santa looks a little scary with the lights
After dinner we headed over to the bar for a drink and to spy on the DJ. At first she just played techno which is just meh for me, but then she started playing fun dancing music which I enjoyed much more. There really weren't that many people there. For as many rooms as they had on the island we really didn't see a lot of people too often. Then again we were on the quiet end of the island which worked out wonderfully for us. When the DJ switched back to some not so good music we decided to call it a night. It was a wonderful Christmas Eve in a gorgeous place!
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