Thulhagiri Island Resort

Pros: 1) convenient location, 2) beautiful surroundings, 3) excellent bar staff. Cons that ruined our vacation. I have never seen such a meager breakfast in any other hotel. It is very limited. For breakfast, lunch, and dinner, they serve only one type of cheese. Fruits are apples and pineapples or papaya. There are no meat or fish appetizers. Seafood is in salads. We arrived at the hotel at 12:00. Out of 16 people, we were the only ones with a child. We were the last to check in, after 14:00. I carried my luggage to the room myself (I was told the employee was busy). The reception staff at (Affan) and other hotels are very unpleasant people. Paint is peeling off the bottom and walls of the pool. The pool is not cleaned during the day. Garbage, dirty glasses, and ashtrays remain all day. The beach area (water) is not cleaned. Vacationers take out the garbage from the water themselves. I collected a lot of trash (plastic, rags) and took it to the shore. I went to reception and asked them to send someone to clean it up, but there was no answer. I returned a few hours later. They cleaned it up. Generally, reception does everything after two requests. These people are very unpleasant. The slot machines in the recreation area are broken. There are breakwaters (rocks in a metal mesh) on the beach. The mesh is torn, and metal is sticking out of the sand. This is very dangerous. It seems the hotel management doesn't care. I sent my comments to the hotel's email address a week ago. No response. No one apologized. I cannot recommend this hotel.

We arrived at Male on a morning and we were directed by our rep from Mercury holidays to wait at the food court. We sat ages waiting for Russian people to disembark their plane and join us in the speedboat and it was really hot. Eventually the other guests arrived and we crossed the road to the speedboat. Getting in and out of the speedboat scares me to death but the staff do help you. Eventually we arrived at the island after a short choppy ride. We were greeted my reception staff and we were seated in the bar area with a refreshing towel and drink. A guy explained everything and said the room should be ready by 2. Mmm, we thought it would be ready immediately, that had been our experience on our previous 2 islands. We couldn't use all inclusive til 12 either. About ten minutes before 12 the barman said we could have drinks which was good of him. We had lunch and enquired about the room again. Not ready. We found the room and discovered the cleaner had finished so went back to reception and told them. So we begrudgingly were given our room. Now if you don't know before you arrive because they don't tell you this, at your first meal you go to the men in the red outfits in the dining room and they tell you where you will be sitting and you meet your waiter. This is your table for the rest of your stay, you don't get to choose. Now many people who haven't read reviews don't know this. They come in find their own table, sit down with food, then are promptly moved by the older red outfitted gentleman, who let's say aren't smiley and pleasant like all the other staff on the island are. If you're only visiting for a couple of days and you are met by their aloof attitude, well the opinion of the whole island decreases. Although our waiter Asim a younger gentleman was amazing. At evening meal we witnessed 3 separate tables of people being moved because they had no clue there is a procedure. They had plates of food, one table had already eaten a plate of food. This is disgraceful treatment. If there's a procedure don't you think it's a good idea to tell people, or have a sign. There is no formal area where you would actually think ooh I need to check by here, because they use a normal dining table, with a few menus on, where the red uniform people sometimes congregate and get in everyone's way. Third Maldive island we've visited and organisation in the buffet here is ridiculous. There is not much room to manoeuvre to the buffet, their table just causes a traffic jam. The food isn't the best. It's barely warm and nowhere to heat it up. Can I suggest a microwave? They work wonders for people who like hot food. The desserts are pretty tragic. Inch cubes of tastelessness on repeat lunch and evening meal. There's no cold meat or tuna to have a salad. The crackers with the one kind of cheese that's ever there are sweet and sometimes soggy. The cookies in the jars at breakfast are stale. I tried lots of different cocktails and they weren't great except one and nothing is consistent. I definitely didn't enjoy many meals. It has a coffee shop menu but no coffee shop! False advertising. Only the main inside bar and a bar on the beach that closes at night. No toilets at the beach bar either and our room is quite a walk away. I don't understand that at all. So only 2 public toilets on the whole island!! And the WiFi didn't work at the beach bar at all.There's nothing for children to eat. Only saw chips once or twice . Only baguette style pizza a couple of times, no nuggets, no children's corner and ice cream is only at night and not every time, in fact it's rare. Smoking and vaping is allowed everywhere except the dining room. And shisha pipes, even in the inside bar. Very third world. Please have a non smoking area. The dress code is non existent. Men in vests in the restaurant. Then at lunch a man in swimming trunks and a t shirt. Come on, this is not a beach bar, there should be some kind of dress code. The cleaner saw me one morning at 7.40 outside. He wanted to clean the room. I said my husband is in there. He just went in with the water. Next thing he's in cleaning. We weren't ready to leave but had to wait til he was finished to get ready for breakfast. Next morning he saw me again. Said cleaning. I said no my husband is still in bed. By afternoon no cleaning so I had to go and explain to reception. Three times he left the back door wide open where the outside shower is and I only found out by accident. Once I was stark naked!! Had a new cleaner half way through our holiday, learning from what I was told. Only swept half the decking as we were on the beds on the decking across from the room waiting til he finished, left no facecloths. And usually there's a lovely fragrance after the cleaner has been. Not on this occasion. Not up to scratch. Maybe have a brush in the room so I can sweep the decking myself. I knew entertainment was low key. The DJ is actually good. The duo? Well yes, ok but all slow songs. The solo artist was worse than the duo. Hardly anyone listening. Nobody could dance to the songs they sang. Hardly anyone clapped and people just drifted off. We had a beach bungalow and I did love it. It was exactly as seen and why I booked here. Ours was 145 opposite the pool. So all the bungalows on this straight have no beds on the beach, unlike the ones situated directly on the proper sandy beach. So we were short changed really. Although the space between them is much bigger than the ones totally on a sandy beach, so a bit more private. Luckily I was up early most mornings and we had 2 beds on the pool decking. But watch out on that decking, the sea gets rough and lashes over the side. One day most people got soaked, us included. The bungalow was handy for the restaurant but didn't give you the secluded feel of the ones on the deep sandy beach. The sunbeds are hard white plastic very uncomfortable. They could do with a topper. Our sand was flat coral sand. I wouldn't have liked the ones set back from the front they just looked shoved in to use up the space. The view wouldn't be good at all. Our fridge froze the drinks. The tins exploded and everything was solid ice. Then the toilet stopped flushing then started again. The waiters in the bar are the best. Hard working, pleasant, will actually chat. They are the epitomy of what all the staff should strive to be like. They do like chocolate and gummy sweets. I gave them something most nights. Please bring them some. The shop doesn't sell much but everything is a ridiculous price. We walked out saying very expensive. If they only dropped the prices they might actually make a sale. Even the garden staff spoke. But the older guys in the restaurant are not doing the island any favours at all. They made me feel uncomfortable as if they are just waiting to pounce if you put a foot out of place. Except Asim who actually took a few minutes to get to know us and us to know him. A mouse ran across the sand where we were sitting in the bar on our first night. And a few times we saw them on other nights too. We had 2 nights left and around 3.30pm reception staff came and asked if we would like a complimentary upgrade to a suite. I declined as it meant packing up and repacking stuff to leave. If it had been at the beginning I would have accepted. My overall opinion is that this is the Butlins of the Maldives. Still expensive but lacking the little touches that you get in other islands. Our last 2 islands were more Ritz compared to this one. It's ok in as much as the views etc are like all the other islands but there are far better islands out there. Management you have a lot of issues that could easily be fixed. The dining nightmare especially. We witnessed poor guests everyday having to move tables mid meal. You really need to get your act together and solve these issues.