We visited Jumeirah Maldives Olhahali for 10 nights at the end of February and had a lovely stay. Jumeirah is the 20-something property we’ve visited in the maldives and this time we booked our stay with Adore Maldives who were great. I can definitely recommend them (Patrycja, especially!!!) for anyone planning a trip here at Jumeirah or anywhere else in the Maldives who is looking for competitive prices and above and beyond service.
The Good
*TRANSFER:
the transfer to jumeirah is swift and on a luxurious, enclosed, air conditioned speedboat. the resort is relatively close to male but it is still about a 55-60 minute ride (the longest speedboat ride we’ve ever been on), so the enclosed boat does help make it a more relaxing journey. IMO, you are much less likely to get sea sick if the water is choppy on one of these boats compared to the more traditional open air speed boats. we found the crew to be very friendly (they even slowed down the boat when we arrived at jumeirah so that i could take some pics of the sandbank and the island from afar), and they offered some amenities like drinks, a cold towel, and snacks - a nice touch, which not all 5* resorts offer on their speedboat transfers!
*VILLA:
we stayed in a deluxe water villa (#62 to be exact). to be honest, the villa is probably the least Maldivian thing i’ve ever seen, but it has a definite wow factor if you’re looking for luxury. im not gonna lie, it does takes a few days to get adjusted to the style since the villa does not blend in with the natural surroundings, especially if you’re used to going to places like six senses, COMO, vakkaru, conrad, etc which are much more traditional in nature, but it would be remiss to say the design is not amazing.
while the villa is not perfect and in several facets prioritizes form over function (e.g., i would REALLY suggest the team get rid of the useless “sun protection” sails and rather put a proper parasol on the deck so that the deck is usable all day), it is comfortable and the rooftop is just beyond spectacular. the views are 15/10 from all corners.
finally, if you’ve booked a deluxe water villa, i recommend requesting a 60-series room as the 70 series have limited swimming opportunities and anything on the sunset side of the island has less scenic views as there is little turquoise lagoon.
*LAGOON/ BEACHES
lagoons are my main priority when selecting an island and jumeriah’s sunrise side lagoon did not disappoint. it looks even better than in pictures since it is SO BLUE. the colors are electric and while you will find some coral rubble in the lagoon if you swim further out, especially as you go closer to the spa, it is free of any sea grass and sea weed which is a huge plus.
the sunrise side beach is also extremely expansive and stunning. the sand is very white (not all beaches in the maldives have sand this white), and there is zero erosion, which is a rarity these days. the one negative is that the shore (especially in front of the pool and by the swing) has a LOT of dead washed up coral residue especially as you enter the water which is painful to walk in. the resort should do a better cleanup in this regard.
the sunset side beach/lagoon area feels much more artificial and the coloring of the water is not at all distinctive, especially under the water villas where it is quite dark in color and not the quintessential maldivian turquoise one may expect when traveling to the destination. i would suggest staying on the sunrise side of the island regardless of whether you’re staying overwater or on land as it is just that much more scenic.
overall i was impressed by how soft the sand is around the entire island despite jumeirah being partially reclaimed.
*REEF:
ok… the reef at jumeirah was a definite surprise. at first, i was not enthused with the snorkeling… but let’s blame that on poor visibility. after a few snorkels and as the visibility increased, i began to LOVE this reef. while the coral here is largely dead and very grey (probably some of the worst regrowth ive seen in maldives by 2023 standards), the fish life is AMAZING. it is like an aquarium of sharks, rays, morays, and all the usual suspects one may find on a maldivian reef! easily one of the best fish soup/life reefs ive seen. the amazing thing here is that you sometimes can see 4 or 5 different species of fish in large sums mix together - a magical sight!
one important thing that i think deserves a shout is just how hard this reef is to snorkel. it is the most difficult reef ive snorkeled in the maldives, and i am pretty adventurous when it comes to snorkeling. the main culprit are the strong currents. the reef is “L” shaped, and it runs from approximately villa 67 on the sunrise side all the way down to villa 50ish on the sunset side. the issue is that the currents will flow in two separate directions depending on your location in the reef. so while for one section of the “L” it might flow one way, it will flow a totally different direction on the other side. we found the strongest currents to be at the “junction” right by the spa area. this makes it very challenging (and at times, absolutely impossible) to snorkel the “L” end to end.
there were very few occasions where i actually felt at the total mercy of the currents which was quite scary and uncomfortable especially when snorkeling alone as it can drag you out very easily… so a word of advice: proceed with caution. jumeriah has really good life guard presence all around the island as i am sure they are aware of just how difficult/potentally dangerous this reef is to snorkel. this is the only resort where i was consistently monitored by the lifeguards.
*SERVICE:
overall, the service at jumeriah is very very high end and feels personalized. we had an amazing butler (Saajy) who took phenomenal care of us from start to finish. he was always present and active on WhatsApp, and super proactive with handling almost one of our request. we also had amazing service at all of the dining venus except for shimmers (more on that below). the hostess/greeters knew our names practically from day 1 and all the servers were beyond kind and learned all of our preferences very quickly. just flawless.
i celebrated my birthday at jumeirah and the team made the whole thing very special. bed decorations and a lovely dinner setup!
also, i have to give the biggest shoutout ever to our roomboy ihushaan who takes the cake as the single best and most amazing villa attendant we have ever come across. literally the nicest guy ever, who cleaned our room twice a day immaculately. he folded our clothes, aligned all our items.. i cannot say enough good things about him. seriously.
*FOOD & DINING:
while i am not generally super impressed with food in the maldives (IMO it is not a foodies destination), we had some good food at jumeirah. our favorite venue is kayto, which has risen in ranks as probably our fave jap restaurant in the maldives, and probably top 3 when comparing it to all restaurants we have dined at in the maldives. the restaurant is managed by the AMAZING Ahmed, which we recognized from our stay at Vakkaru a few years ago, who treated us oh sooooo very nicely for our entire stay. he is another person that i cannot praise enough!!
the breakfast at jumeirah is also stellar. i think i have only had 1 better breakfast in the maldives and that was at amilla, but the vibes were very similar. lots of options with undoubtedly the best crepes ive EVER had in my life. the plating and composition of all the breakfast dishes were so so beautiful. i am pretty sure i was 50% “mixed berry crepe” by the time we left the island….
one thing that we felt was missing was dining in the sand. while glow and kayto do not afford this opportunity, this is something that should be available at shimmers. overall we felt that the dining venues were a bit too dubai and blingy (lots of marble) and not very maldivian, but thats a small price to pay for excellent food….
definitely partake in the very reasonably priced BBQ night as it includes everything any more, including lobster!
The Bad
*Inflatable Slide
for the bulk of our stay, jumeirah decided it was a fantastic to add a very ugly, sizable, inflatable plastic slide right in the middle of the most beautiful section of the beach on the sunrise side of the island. i am still baffled as to why anyone would every even considering adding this to a 5* deluxe maldivian property as it is really the most out of context, mass market addition ever.
I first inquired about this slide situation back in january when i had noticed that this slide had been added as part of the xmas festivities as no information about it existed anywhere on the official website, and last i checked i had not booked a resort in shark el sheikh…. the reservations team assured me that this slide would only be there until the end of the NYE holidays (i had this in writing). thank god!
well, when we arrive in Jumeirah, guess what we found?! the darn inflatable slide! which coincidentally was right in front of our villa. of course i informed saajy but it took more than a week (!) for this slide to be removed. i am glad that we got to spend our last 2 days without the slide, but the whole situation was not handled gracefully.
when i raised this to Saajy, the GM got involved and his answer as to why it could not be removed was that “it was not fair for the children and that they could move my room”…. ummm ok? also, not gonna happen since i did not want to be switched to a room without a lagoon view.
if you put 2+2 together and read between the lines, it was beyond obvious that a wealthy family staying in one of the expensive multi bedroom villas had requested the team to add the slide (last minute) for the duration of their stay to entertain the children, and management did not want to upset them.
so i guess the solution was to upset someone else (hint: us)? nice.
i suggested that they move the slide to another section of the beach, perhaps on the sunset side or by the 80 series villas, but i was told this was not possible given lack of lifeguard presence (sorry but that is not a good excuse).
overall not very accommodating and showed very little ability to compromise in part of management.
this entire interaction left a very sour taste in my mouth since we were also paying a lot of money to be there and being told (between the lines of course) that “this family that is paying 3x as much as you wants it so its here to stay until they leave“ made it seem that some guests are valued more than others ….. i contemplated giving jumeirah 4* based on this alone as it was just handled so poorly.
*Some aspects of the service:
The service at Shimmers honestly left a lot to be desired. in my travels to Maldives, i have found that pool service is not the strongest suit of any resort but at Shimmers it was particularly poor. Especially when you’re paying $50 net for a burger or a gyro. On one occasion, the host seated me and it took them 20-30 minutes to bring me a menu, and the restaurant was not full. Another time, we ordered gyro and not only did it take over 30-40 minutes to get our food, but the order was also wrong.
this was rectified when i brought it up to my butler. and, actually, after the second complaint, the service got a lot better, but these are not things that should need intervention at such a deluxe property.
it is a pity as the food is really great (octopus salad to die for), they just gotta polish their service without having to complain first!
*Clientele
We definitely had issues with the clientele. I am not sure if we got unlucky with school holidays or what, but the first 4-5 days of our stay the place was SWARMING with pretty obnoxious families (primarily russian and arab). and some of them were SO loud with little regard for other guests. one day we were relaxing in the pool area, and an arab family decided it was totally ok to start doing flips in an already petty small pool. they even paid off some of the staff to entertain their kids (e.g., throw them a soccer ball for them to hit with their head as they back flipped into the pool..) which felt very strange…. the staff seemed totally fine with it too rather than maybe saying something. hmm…
the clientele during our stay very “bling bling” with lots of designer items (Gucci, Versace, etc), high heels at dinners, etc. nothing wrong about this but its definitely not a barefoot island….
the last few days occupancy dropped to what i am sure is no more than 30%, and the island felt much more “livable” then, especially since it was primarily adults.
overall: would we return? yes, absolutely (well, as long as the slide is not there lol), but only at this year’s price point. i do feel that outside of the voyage prive/luxury escapes special offers, the resort is does not offer good value for money (it is certainly not worth the $15-20k a week prices that are published on the website, no way). so let’s see what sort of deals/pricing come out for 2024 as we would love to return but only at a reasonable price
thank you so much jumeirah for a lovely stay!
