After our refreshing welcome drinks, we were escorted to our water villa by buggy and given a run-down of how everything works (lots of automation and electronics!). The villa was massive, at 166sqm (!!!!). I think it’s actually bigger than our apartment back in Shanghai, *lol*. We did expect a large room, but nothing like this… It’s hands down the most luxurious room I’ve ever stayed in.. situated over the most beautiful ocean I’ve ever laid my eyes on. Hurray for Maldives 🙂

Our “villa host” was a lovely guy named Azleem, who introduced himself when we arrived and even offered to organise to have our bags unpacked for us. He would be attending to our every need during our stay in Shangri-La and it was incredible to witness his attention to detail and his ability to just make anything and everything happened. I think the whole resort is wired up to keep track of guests’ behaviour (like “Big Brother”, heh).. because he always knew when we were at breakfast, when we needed buggys, and knew when to call us in our room to enquire where he should book lunch or dinner each day. Everything was no problem to him and it was through his organising of each day that everything just fell into place (seemingly) effortlessly. It was so comforting and satisfying to know someone was looking after us – it meant we didn’t need to think or organise what we wanted to do each day – we were simply told of what was available and after making our selections, it would be all organised for us. Unbelievable service.

Do you know what else is surprising? All the staff there know each guest’s name. We’re greeted with a “Hello Mr and Mrs Burgess!” whenever they see us, so I wonder if they have photographs of all guests and spend an hour each day memorising names or something 😛 The ratio of staff-to-guest is around 4 staff to 1 guest (!!), so the service is top notch and incredibly attentive. It’s wonderful and makes for a totally worry-free honeymoon.

I won’t describe the room in detail, since you can see the photos below. Let’s just say we were more than happy to spend every day lounging in our villa 😛

Hellooooo and welcome to the Shangri-La 🙂

Buggy!!

Approaching the water villas

Our villa – Whispering Palms #19

In the entrance corridor looking left towards espresso machine and bar

Delicious loose tea leaves

Lofty high ceilings

The bedroom, with incredibly soft bed! They did a whole design of red rose petals for us,
but Chris won’t let me post a photo of it ‘cos he says it’s weird to :X

I chose the buckwheat pillow

Incense sticks

The whole villa’s Bose surround-sound enabled, right to the back where the showers are!

Bottle of champagne for us 🙂

Big walk in closet

Indoor shower with 3 (?!) types of showerheads

Main bathroom area.. with one BIG bathtub

Looking towards sink #1

Sink #2 on the opposite side. Love their taps btw!

Outdoor shower with the ocean below. Very sexy to have a shower outdoors under the moonlight..

Lots of toiletries and amenities

The outdoor deck with sunbed and table. Step down onto the
lower deck for the 2 deckchairs and hammock!

LET’S CELEBRATE!!

How we spend most evenings.. lounging outside above the ocean, listening to the waves
and surfing the internet 😛