Author: JP

Three days in the Maldives was not enough but fun nonetheless. We were sad to leave such a wonderful place but we will definitely be coming back again. Since our flight was leaving at 23:35, we secured a late checkout from our room till 6:30pm. The boat would leave the dock to the airport at 8pm. The good thing about checkout is that you don’t have to take your bags with you from the room. It will be picked up by staff and then you verify your belongings at the dock before boarding the boat.

The first 4 pictures are from the resort as you can tell. It truly was a wonderful place to stay at. Staff was friendly and helpful. Even though there were many guests at the resort (lots of families), you never noticed them on the grounds other than when you were having meals at the restaurants.

The HI sign that greets you on the dock. We identified our bags which were packed in the boat and we got in. There were other guests leaving with us.

Our boat taking us to the airport.

View from the dock showing the main reception and restaurant area.

It truly is amazing to see the moonlight reflecting on the water. We experienced this every night at the resort and it’s good to just sit on the beach and admire the view.

Docked safely at the airport jetty, collected our bags and went inside. Our bags were scanned at the entrance and we proceeded to the check-in desk. Cathay was at the far end and this greeted us at the Business class line.

A pic of the economy line for check-in.

Check-in was done after a 20 minute wait in line even though there were 2 desks for J class. Grr.
Took some pictures of the departures screen along with other airline check in desks.

Went upstairs and proceeded through immigration and security. Once through, we landed up in the duty free area.

Took a quick walk through the duty free and there was nothing of interest to us. So, we headed to the safety of the lounge.

It was crowded when we got in but after 20 minutes, people left and we grabbed these 2 seats near the window.

Emirates being prepped for departure.

Since we didn’t have any dinner, we got some grub at the lounge. Was surprised to see a few good hot items.

By the time I came back to my seat, Emirates was being pushed back.

45 minutes before departure, a lounge agent came around and politely announced for Cathay Pacific guests to head to gate. Got to the gate where our boarding passes were scanned and we headed down the waiting bus.

Turkish A330 that landed approximately 30 minutes before.

Here’s our lovely bird taking us to HKG.

Holy reflection, batman.

I love boarding a plane via stairs. Brings back memories of the old days.

The FA greeted us at the door and when we found our seats, I started snapping away. There were a few J class passengers at this point, so it gave me opportunity to take pics without being interrupted.

Seat pic.

Fresh watermelon juice for the both of us which was sweet. What, no champagne? Guess they don’t serve it on the ground.

Monitors.

Seats controls and other fancy buttons.

Window seat next to me which was empty for the flight.

Flight map.

Headset.

Menu.

Since this was a late night flight and I gorged at the lounge, I passed on dinner. My wife did go for the light meal. When I woke up in the morning and asked her what she thought of the meal, her response was “Eww”. Enough said. 🙂

His Amenity Kit.

Her Amenity Kit.

We took off on time and once the seat belt sign went off, I put the seat into bed mode and gave the Mrs a good night kiss. Woke up 30 minutes before landing and quickly managed to snap this pic during our descent.

As we flew beneath the clouds, it became really foggy. So much that I didn’t see the water leading to the runway until we were at least 100-150 feet above. No hiccups on landing though.

United birds as we were taxi-ing to the gate.

Cathay A340.

Pic of how foggy it was.

Dragonair A320’s.

Hong Kong Airlines A330. I took this flight from HKG to PEK in May 2013. The hard product was fantastic and the FA service was very good.

More Cathay birds.

Cebu Pacific. I miss the Philippines. 🙂

We disembarked and made our way to immigration. At 9am, the visitors line was empty unlike our May 2013 visit where the lineup was long. Anyways, we were processed and picked up our bags. Since we had some time to kill before we were to check in to our hotel, we spent some time at The Arrival lounge. It’s a small lounge with basic features and amenities (shower, washrooms etc). After having some breakfast, we freshened up and left after an hour.

Next stop – Kowloon!

Pic on the Airport Express.

As mentioned in the last post, our hotel rep was waiting with a sign as we came out of security. He collected our bags, tagged them and we did not see them till we got to our room.

After a 15 minutes wait for other passengers, we made our way to the dock where the boat was waiting for us.

We were given life jackets, boareded the boat and were on our way. The “first mate” introduced himself and the rest of the boat crew. It took us approximately 45 minutes to reach the resort.

Safety card for us to read.

Gotta love that turquoise blue.

The crew was trying to tell us which resorts these were but it was so hard to hear them over the engine noise. So

we just nodded our heads that we understood lol.

Finally, we came to our stop.

There was a rep waiting for all of us at the dock and we hopped into the buggy and were driven to the chech-in

area. A young fellow by the name of Asanka was assigned to help us check-in.

Cold water to beat away the heat which was gratefully accepted.

Lobby area.

Check-in desk.

Once the check-in process was completed, Asanka said he would take us to our room since it was a far walk. Before

that, I requested that we stop by the Dive centre so that we could book our dives for the next 2 days. He was more

than accomodating and we spent the next 20 minutes booking our dives. After that, he took us to our room and

explained the different areas we passed along the way.

Garden Villas

Ginormous tree

Road leading to all the beach view villas

Got to our room where Asanka showed us the in’s and out’s and he left us to our own devices.

View of the beach from our room.

Found this in the drawer and was really amused by it and the price list

Far away from the real South Beach 😉

Over Water Bungalows.

See that black area in the pic. Thats a huge school of fish just chilling around the beach area.

Activities centre where you can rent canoes, kayaks, surf boards etc.

Pool area

One of the premium restaurants on the resort

The dive centre in the background

This side of the island was the surfers area as it had very strong waves

AAAhhhhhhh, Kaijuuuuu!!

Beach houses which were on the surfers side of the resort

Area outside the main restaurant which was used for people who choosing either the breakfast, HB or FB options.

On our last night, there was a band set up to play

A really funny note – there was WIFI available only in the hotel lobby area. It was extemely hilarious watching people camping around the lobby area and using their devices to connect to the outside world. Guess its really hard to unplug sometimes.

On our last night, we had a bit of an ant infestation issue. We came back from dinner and saw the floor littered slightly with dead ants. I would assume they could not handle the AC as we left it low during our dinner. A quick call to reception resolved the issue. The guy came and sprayed down the room and bathroom with ant repellant and swept all the dead bodies out. #firstworldproblems.

Last but not least, here are a few pictures from our dives. Overall opinion, I was not impressed but the 2nd day of diving made up for the experience as I caught a few pics of the moray eels and lionfish. Did see a turtle but it was far out and could not get a good pic. Also, I did see a couple sharks swmimming at the bottom of the reef but

since I’m only OW certified, I couldnt go to the bottom.

Yes master diver, I am ok. Now go away. 🙂

Peek a boo, I see you!

So, after 5 days of fun in the desert sun, it was time to leave and see what the hoopla this Maldives place is all about. Our family dropped us off at the airport and check-in was done after a 15 minute wait in line. Immigration and security checks were also efficient. Point to make to North American airports – get the automated bucket loaders that Dubai airport uses. These things are awesome and I didn’t know they existed. The buckets or trays where you put your belongings in before it gets scanned is auto loaded into the belt and does not require a passenger to manually pull out of a stack. Once you are through the check, the bucket or tray is auto pushed into a bin and gets fed back to the front of the security check. What an age we live in ! Ok, I digress. Onto the lounge!

Thanks to my Priority Pass membership, we got into the Marhaba lounge in Concourse B. Got a good seat and was able to take a few pics of planes taxi-ing by and getting ready to take off.

Fly Dubai plane in the background and an Emirates A380 having a stare down. The Fly Dubai plane won out and took off first.

British B777 just landed and taxi-ing to a gate.

Emirates A380 taxi-ing.

Emirates A380 from earlier lined up for take off.

Emirates B777 just pulled in.

Shot of the lounge. Quick assessment showed a decent choice of food and drinks. There is also another side of the lounge not seen here but it faces the inside track of the airport above the main concourse level. Too much noise on that side which made us grateful that we were on this side.

After freshening up at the lounge, we made our way to the gate. Here is the pic of our bird taking us to the Maldives.

Sight awaiting us as we came down the elevator after first check-in at the gate. This was 30 minutes before final close but the monitor was saying “Final Call”. If the point was to scare people to run to the gate and not miss their flight, then good job Emirates. You scared the crap out of me. ><

Another pic of our bird.

Registration A6-EMO

Middle of the bus.

Shot out of the window. A lovely day to fly.

Safety video playing.

Wait a minute, why is there no leg room in Business class … oh wait.

Turned out the flight was 3/4 full and we had a spare seat. I took a look at the back of the plane and there were many seats available.

Time for push back.

More Emirates heavies getting ready for the morning bank of flights out.

Menu.

Choice of meals on the flight today.

Choice of meals for the Maldives – Colombo flight. The flight continues on to Colombao after the Maldives and the back to Dubai.

Emirates A340.

British B777’s

Virgin Atlantic A340

2 Qatar A320’s

Taking our spot in line for take off.

View from the screen.

Cabin crew, please take your seats.

Lined up and ready to go.

You can tell from the pic that we were going really fast. 🙂

Hey Emirates, your wings are dirty. With all the money I gave you, please buy some Lysol. 😀

Hey! Why is my meal so small and where’s the champagne? …. Oh .. right. Damn you Business class for spoiling me rotten. 
Went with the Sri Lankan chicken curry. The salad and main were good. Dessert was ok – note to Emirates, whip cream not equal to mousse.

4 hours later, we began our descent and was treated to the wonderful views outside. Slightly sucked that we were right over the wing and blocked some of the view.

Coming in for landing.

Coming in for landing on the screen. Its fun watching on the monitor. You always think you’re gonna miss the runway but then the pilots yank it last minute.

Hit the runway REALLY HARD. Seriously Captain, I know Boeings can take a beating but no need to test it out. 😦

A good sign of things to come.

Walking down the stairs. The heat really hits you the moment you step out.

Look at all those beauties.

After cleaning baggage screening and immigration, we came out and found our hotel representative. We were talked to the booth and our bags were tagged. We did not see the bags till we got to our room. Wonderful service.

All the flights coming to the Maldives.

Our ride to the hotel.

Our flight back to Dubai from Mumbai was uneventful. Unlike the scrum during the boarding process in T2, the

boarding process here was orderly and people actually lined up. Kudos to you, Emirates, for cracking the whip. 🙂

Our family picked us up from the airport and dropped us off at the Golden Sands 3 where we booked our stay for the

next 5 days. For those not familiar with this hotel chain, I would highly recommend it due to its budget prices

(approx $100 a night) and its also hotel apartments. All supplies/appliances are provided in the room and there

was a supermarket located a minute away walking distance. It is also located in the Al Karama district of Dubai. I

prefer this area compared to say Downtown Dubai mainly for the fact that there are amazing restaurants around

within walking distance of the hotel at cheap prices. It is also within walking distance of the Bur Juman mall

with easy access to the Metro system. It is also within minutes of Bur Dubai which is famous for its gold souks

and the Dubai creek.

Our first night was a write off since we landed at the hotel around 6:30pm and just ended up getting take out from

a seafood restaurant. The next day, we hit up the Dubai Mall and I went click crazy.

Ice rink in the mall. Only true ice hockey fans can truly get excited just by seeing a zamboni.

This area of the mall is what I dubbed “Give Us Your Wallet Alley” where all the ultra luxury brands are located

…. Gucci, Prada, Dior, Fendi, Chanel etc.

The Dubai Dancing fountain area during daytime. Later on, will be pics posted at night.

The next day, our cousins picked up and drove us around the Jumeirah area. Pics below are from Jumeirah beach, in front of the Atlantis hotel and Dubai Marina.

Cousin volunteered to take a pic of us 🙂

This pic is the sunset view from the road oppoisite the Atlantis hotel.

After that, we headed over to the Dubai Marina and snapped up a few pics.

The next day, we went on a desert safari. My wife’s uncle booked the trip and we did the package tour that

includes driving on the dunes plus a dinner and show afterwards.

Unfortunately, could not get any pics of the dinner show as my camera battery decided to face plant. ><

On our final day in Dubai, we went to Bur Dubai. We went on the abra commuter boat which took us from one side of

the creek which is Bur Dubai to the other side which is Deira. For 1 dihram each way, it cant be beat.

Next stop, City of Gold! This is pretty much all stores selling gold products and any other type of jewellery that might interest a person.

Later on that evening, my uncle took us back to the Dubai Mall to watch the dancing fountain show. My opinion, meh. 🙂

Burj Khalifa at night

The signal that the show is about to begin

After the show, we headed back to the hotel to pack. Pic of Sheikh Zayed Road as we were heading back.

The Dubai Trade Centre … once the tallest building in Dubai. How times have changed.

After coming back from the trip and reviewing the pics, I noticed I took more pics of the airport and the lounge than I did of the airplane lol. So please keep in mind, this will report will be heavy with lounge pics.

The Emirates Chauffeur service picked us up at 12:30am local time in a Volvo sedan and we were at the airport in 15 minutes. Check-in was smooth although the lady at the counter was … well, not happy. I guess it’s probably due to the fact it was close to 1am in the morning.

Check-in carpet. Once you walk into the dedicated check-in area for F/J passengers, the first few booths are for First Class and then next area is for Business class.

Security was a breeze and this was the sight that greeted us out of the elevator.

We headed downstairs again to take the train over to Concourse A. Once at the new concourse, we made our way up to the main level.

Hmm, should I take the elevator or the escalator?

Sigh, perhaps I will get the chance to enter Xanadu someday. So close and yet so far away.

Our stop.

We presented our boarding cards and this was the conversation:
Agent: “Sir, your boarding gate is at concourse C and we are in concourse A, it would take a “long” time to walk over. Would you prefer to the Emirates lounge located at concourse C?”
Translation in my brain: “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!”
Me: “No, we would prefer to stay here.” (with a smile)
Translation in my brain: “Oh hell mother-bleeping NO, I’ve been waiting to see this lounge since it opened last year and aint no one gonna stop me!” 🙂
Agent: “No problem. I would suggest you stay here for an hour and then walk over and it is a very long walk. Please don’t be late as we don’t want you to miss your flight.”

Oooooooh, shiny.

Hmm, which way do we go? Magic 8 ball says “Go right.”

Outgoing flights monitor.

Dining area.

Was trying to figure how I could put this in my carry-on and take it home with me. 🙂

One of many coffee/cappuccino machines throughout the lounge.

The great thing about Concourse A is that you can board the plane directly from the F and J lounges.

Another monitor.

Geez, this thing goes on forever.

Wait, I think I see the end.

The end of the concourse is a quiet area. Which makes me think if the rest of the lounge is mean to be a loud area?

In case you lose your way and need directions. 

It just keeps on going …

And going …

Pic of the newspaper stand.

Some more couches and the area behind it had some lazy loungers which were all taken, hence no pic.

The Dining area.

Walking back to our starting point.

Seriously Emirates, upgrade to Windows 7 at least.

We left the lounge and took the train back. Interesting to note that the trains have actual tires and not wheels like a normal train.

We did the “long walk” to Concourse C (seriously, it wasn’t that bad as the agent made it out to be lol) and bought some chocolates from the duty free as we had a little bit of time to kill. Headed to our gate and waiting for the boarding call. When the boarding announcement came, it was like this:

Agent: “Ladies and gentleman, thank you for waiting. At this time, we would like to invite families with children, those requiring wheelchair assistance. We would especially like to invite those travelling in First and Business class to board as well.”

This happens and I kid you not.

Can you see that blue couple on the right side near the middle of the pic? That was us. Le sigh. It’s a good thing that the agent was checking boarding passes as she turned away economy passengers. The stupid thing is that the economy passengers just stood there and prevented others from coming up front. This, ladies and gentlemen, calls for a double facepalm.

Anyways, we boarded and found our seats. By this time, we were both super tired and just wanted to pass out. In my desire to pass out, I forgot to take pics of the menu. This, ladies and gentlemen, calls for a ….

What I do remember is that the food was all Indian cuisine and I was not in the mood for that since I gorged on food at the lounge and I would get better Indian food when I was in Mumbai. Speaking of lounge food, three words for anyone visiting the lounge … Deep Fried Butterfish. I had it when I was at the Emirate J lounge in Concourse B in 2011 and it was still mouth watering-ly good when I had it again this time. You know when your jowls shiver with excitement when you are tasting something so good .. yeah, thats how I felt.

The flight was delayed by 20 minutes because the IFE in the row we were sitting on completely fried out for some reason. It was interesting seeing the Emirates engineering crew come on and swap out the unit in the back of one of the seats. One of the passengers had to move from the seat temporarily while the fix was being completed. Once the fix was done, the system was rebooted and all the IFE’s came on .. except for ours. Good news is that we didn’t care because we just wanted to sleep. The engineering crew disembarked and we were ready to be pushed back. While we were waiting for the fix to be completed, the purser came by and wanted to take our menu choices but we declined. He was a nice gentleman from Brazil and was asking where we were from since our last name was common in Spain, Brazil and India. Its the small things that make your experience very pleasant. Take off was smooth and when the seat belt sign went out, we crashed … er .. went to bed. 😀

The captain did come on the comm before we took off and announced an approximate flight time of 2h 30m. On the ticket, the flight time was originally clocked at 2h 55m. After I woke up, I was treated to this out of the window. 😀

Landed on time and with no issues. Taxi-ed past the domestic terminal and made our way to the old international terminal. The pic you see below is the gates for the new terminal.

Then it merges into the old terminal. Yuck.

Air India B787. No smoke or battery fires.

Saudi B777

Disembarked from the plane and made our way through immigration. Since I was an OCI (Overseas Citizen of India), we made our way to the OCI line which was small. Our bags were already there by the time we got to the baggage carousel. Made our way outside and found the Emirates Chauffeur driver waiting for us with the signage. Couldn’t take a proper pic of the Merc C200 because the guy was in rush to get out the parking lot. Oh well. 🙂

On our way back to Dubai, we were 5 days short of the opening day of the new T2 terminal (rats!). Luckly, my sister and mother who were also in Mumbai were lucky enough to depart from T2 on opening day (flying on Etihad). So, I stole all my sisters pics of the new terminal off her iPad because I love you guys so much. 🙂

Few comments from my sister:
1. Etihad First/Business class check-in was in a seperate pier from economy. There were only 2 check-in desks open for economy and it was a complete mess for people checking in. Somehow, a few economy class passengers decided to try their luck at the F/J counters but were turned back.
2. Immigration and security had dedicated lanes for F/J. The agents at immigration and security were REALLY nice according to my sister and mother by addressing them as “Ma’am” and asking how their stay in India was. Meanwhile, at the old terminal, the agents barely gave me a second glance. ><
3. A wheelchair assistance staff member tried to sneak an elderly gentleman through to the F/J immigration lane. When the other staff members tried to bring more people through on wheelchairs, they were turned away by immigration and told to go to the regular immigration lanes. Ouch.
4. The lounge was not ready but there was a temporary lounge that was roped off. There was a decent spread of food and drink.
5. The plane was delayed for an hour because economy passengers were still being checked in.
6. When boarding was called for F/J, everyone thought it meant economy too and there was no proper check done by agents. My sister and mother were stuck behind a line of economy class passengers. The agent walked them half way through the tube before they got stuck again. At this point, the agent shouted in Hindi to catch the purser’s attention. The purser looked at the agent and then the agents shouts, “BUSINESS CLASS!” and points to my mother/sister. The line of economy passengers parted like Moses parting the sea and they walked in. Why do they get to have all the fun! 😀

Nothing much to report here other than it was a connecting flight to Dubai. After deplaning, we headed through security and then the Austrian Airlines lounge. The first pic is taken from the lounge. We had a 4.5 hour layover and we made the most of it by taking a nap at the lounge. I did partake of the shower facilities and it was clean and well kept.

View from the lounge

View of our bird from the gate area. Turned out to be the same bird we took from YYZ.

OS B777

Since we had a few minutes to kill before boarding, we walked down the concourse and took some pics of the different birds parked around.

Panoramic shot from my Olympus cam

Boarding began with business class first. J class passengers were put into the holding area right in front of the gate itself while economy were roped off behind us. It was a full flight in both classes. Pic of my seat with the Mrs next to me.

Amenity kit.

Screen in front of me.

Logo at the front.

Pre-departure champagne.

Menu pics. I did not post all the drink selections as it was the exact same on the previous flight.

Lunch service started with appetizers. It was cart service again and I asked for a sampling of all choices plus the creamy tomato soup. Everything was fantastic except for the cold eggplant which you see at the bottom of the plate.

For the main, both of us went with the butterfish which was a bit dry and overcooked but the fennel puree was awesome.

Rounding out dessert, I went with the strawberry parfait which was good. The Mrs went with the banana chocolate tart which was super chocolaty for my liking.

Finally, the coffee menus were distributed and I went with the Baileys Coffee which was super strong.

We landed on time in Dubai with the pilot hitting the runway pretty hard. Could not take any pics as I in the middle row. We passed by all the gates at Concourse C and parked at a remote stand even though there were many gates available that night. No idea why that happened. Proceeded to immigration which was an absolute zoo and each line was at least 45 minutes. Had family pick us up after we got our luggage as we had 2 hours to freshen up and change before Emirates limo picked us up. 🙂

Next up – DXB-BOM with Emirates Business Class lounge in Concourse A.

Welcome to my site. This site contains all trip adventures over the years either through points or purchase deals. Sit back, relax and hope you enjoy the ride. 🙂