DESTINATIONS MALDIVES | WINTER SUN
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Top tech and a collaboration with the Manta Trust gives guests at the InterContinental Maldives Maamunagau Resort fascinating insights into an underwater world, finds Tamara Hinson
’m not usually a fan of boardwalks or overwater villas. Holidays shouldn’t be about leaving 20 minutes to walk from your accommodation to the bar, after all. But that changed when I arrived at
the InterContinental Maldives Maamunagau Resort. My one-bedroom beach pool villa has everything a villa in the Maldives should have, including a beautiful infinity pool that sits over the waves. Its two-storey design is a refreshing change
from the open-plan layout of many villas (the living room-like ground floor means that I can do early morning workouts, or watch TV, without disturbing my other half). But the best thing about my villa is the marine life sightings: from the huge bath positioned next to the floor-to-ceiling windows on the first floor I spy stingrays gliding under the surface. Plus, it turns out that getting to the accommodation is half the fun too. With the majority of villas positioned around an enormous lagoon – some on small sandbanks – the meandering boardwalks that connect them become my preferred viewing platform.
travelweekly.co.uk 31 AUGUST 2023
MARINE HEAVEN Within 24 hours of arriving, I’ve seen sharks, stingrays and manta rays during the walk – or cycle – from my villa to the resort’s main hub.
Its location works in its favour: at the southern end
of Raa Atoll, near the northern tip of Baa Atoll, and just a short boat ride from Hanifaru Bay in the heart of the Baa Atoll Unesco Biosphere Reserve, this is one of the Maldives’ most wildlife-rich regions. And it’s about to get even better, thanks partly due to in-house marine biologist Jess Haines, who set up a research base for the Manta Trust charity in the resort’s dive centre in 2019. It is hoped that the team’s work will help to make this a Marine Protected Area. Manta rays congregate here to feast on plankton and enjoy spruce-ups at the “cleaning stations” – where tiny fish nibble off dead skin and parasites. Guests can become citizen scientists on manta-spotting tours, and help take photos to add to Jess and her team’s database, to help them identify individual mantas. ²
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PICTURE: Manta Trust
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