The sea was crystal clear, warm, and an almost unbelievable shade of turquoise, stretching out into a vast, glassy lagoon that seemed to reach right to the horizon. The sand, whiter than any sand I had ever seen, was soft like the bags of play sand we would buy for the kids when they were little. Had I tried to imagine the Maldives in my minds eye before we landed, this would indeed have been what I would see.
Welcome to paradise.
We had arrived on Maafushi Island on 2 January 2025, following 18 hours of travel - an 11 hour flight from Heathrow, a further one hour flight south to Dhaalu and another half an hour on a turbulant speedboat transfer. It rained heavily, from the moment we landed in Male to the second day of our time on the island. It was hot, heavy, tropical rain, and whilst we were initially bemused to have left cold rainy London only to find ourselves in a warm rainy paradise - we quickly settled into the belief that if it was going to rain for our entire week in the Maldives, at least it was warm and beautiful and restful. Perhaps that’s just what we needed anyway.
On our second day, the sun started to peek out from behind the clouds, and by the third day the vivid blues of sea and sky were utterly glorious; warm, sunny, and stunning - like nowhere we had ever been on this earth.
The Maldives feels like paradise - a place of escape and rest. And yet, beneath its beauty lies a fragility that’s impossible to ignore. Can we, as travellers, really enjoy it’s beauty without questioning its future - and our role in shaping it?
The Maldives had been on our bucket list for quite some time, with Soneva resort and it’s over-water bungalows popping up in our Instagram feed on the regular. Since Mark’s cancer diagnosis we have tried to consistently make our bucket list wishes happen and so we decided last year it was time to visit.
Once or twice a year we take a trip without any of our children - as a blended family together for over 12 years now, and with five children between us - it has been a prerequisite for many years to take some time out on our own. This was going to be that trip. More often that not our travels are busy, we like to visit the sights and see as much of the local culture as we can - and as owners of two businesses (a coworking space and a mental health app, if you’re not already familiar) we almost always take our laptops away with us. Yes, even on the Camino de Santiago we had to work a little.
This holiday would be different. Our business partner was looking after the coworking space while we were away, and our app would need only a little support during that week. The laptops were there on the coffee table, and we dabbled, but the focus of this trip was to take our first restful beach holiday in several years. And goodness, did we both need it.
By 1 January 2025 we were both fairly exhausted, Christmas had been lovely but full on as usual, and changes in our businesses were causing us some stress. Mark had just given up a soul destroying full time job and we needed some time out. Hence we found ourselves lying on sun loungers on a sandy beach on Maafushi Island, at the Riu Atoll hotel, thousands of miles away from home.
With a beachfront room, our daily routine went something like this; wake up, sit on the beach with a green tea to do our Wim Hof breathing exercises (we’ve been doing this daily for almost a year now), throw on some clothes, go for a coffee, go to the gym, swim, rest, lunch, rest, swim, walk, game of cards and a Copacabana Mocktail, walk the beach, swim, check emails, shower, dinner, sleep, and repeat.
Reader, it was utter bliss. It took a couple of days to adjust to the five hour time difference, for sure, but we rested as much as we could, slept a little and read a lot (Circe by Madeline Miller for me and The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell for Mark). When we first arrived I was worried I’d feel a little claustrophobic on the island, so far from home and with nothing in front of us as far as the eye could see, but I soon adjusted to the quiet and the disconnection.
There can be no exaggerating the beauty of the Maldives. At the tip of our island was a sand bank that many of the hotel guests were drawn to daily. When the tide was out, you could walk so far out into the sand bank that it felt like you were standing in the middle of the sea. The crystal clear waves broke on the distant reef, the sun reflecting on the white horses. Tiny white and grey fish and small reef sharks (whom we affectionally named Trevor for the duration) would swim past our feet, as we walked sand that was the softest sand I have ever experienced. The horizon seemed to go on forever, calming the mind and easing the soul.
The sunsets were unlike any sunsets we’ve seen. The sky would turn pink and the light would change across the island, almost as if there was a solar eclipse. I have never seen anything quite like it.
We had many pinch me moments on this island, looking out to the never-ending horizon and snatching brief early morning moments on an entirely empty beach that felt like it might be ours alone.
The beauty of the Maldives is almost disorienting but beneath its tranquil surface lies a fragility that is impossible to ignore.
Walking along the shoreline, we saw how the island staff were constantly moving the sand from one end of the beach to another, fighting to keep the beach clean and just right for their guests. Every day, we would walk along the beach picking up bottle tops, old flip flops, fishing line and other plastics - one day we even found a toilet cistern washed up on the beach. Let me clarify - the hotel did a wonderful job of keeping the beaches clean but it was clearly an endless activity for them.
Mark spent some of the trip teaching himself how to use chopsticks sat on the beach, picking up each tiny shell carefully one by one and marvelling at the many colours in front of him, until he realised that most of those colours were coming from microplastics, washed up on the shore. The contrast between this idyllic paradise and the ever encroaching plastics in the ocean was striking.
The resort’s staff mentioned that some of the islands we had flown over on our way here were uninhabitable, the slowly rising sea swallowing them piece by piece. Whilst rising sea levels haven’t yet caused the extent of damage to the islands that was predicted thirty years ago, frequent flooding and coastal erosion is still a threat. It’s hard to imagine that this paradise, with its vast skies and endless horizons, could ever disappear. But the signs are there if you choose to look.
We took a snorkelling trip on our second last day - a chance to see the coral reefs that fringe these islands. The water, warm and impossibly clear, was teeming with vibrant fish. Yet some of the coral we found was pale, brittle, and ghostly despite the hotel’s best efforts to conserve and restore it. It was beautiful, yes, but some of it was also dying - a stark reminder of the strain our planet is under.
One study has predicted that large areas of the Maldives could be uninhabitable by as soon as 2050.
This knowledge sat uncomfortably beside the indulgence of the trip. How could we marvel at such beauty while knowing it might not be here for the next generation? And yet, isn’t that part of the tension of travel itself? We go to these faraway places seeking peace, even as we play a part in their fragility.
The Maldives is not just a place; it’s a question. It asks us to think about the choices we make, the footprints we leave, and what it means to truly appreciate and protect the world’s most fragile wonders.
After just over a week of sunsets that painted the sky pink, early morning walks along a shifting shoreline, and quiet moments of awe on an empty beach, we left Maafushi Island with a sense of gratitude - and, if I’m honest, a little unease.
The Maldives is a place of contradictions: a soothing paradise even as it reminds you of its fragility. I don’t pretend to have answers about the ethics of international travel or the dilemmas of visiting such vulnerable places. But perhaps what we took away from this once-in-a-lifetime holiday was the importance of noticing. Noticing the beauty, yes, but also the fragility. Noticing the marks we leave and the moments we cherish.
We returned home rested, ready to face an endless British January, and carrying a little piece of paradise in our hearts. Whether that paradise endures for generations to come is an open question. But as I look back on that week, I’m reminded of something simple: that appreciating the world around us begins with being fully present in it.
questions about the Maldives?
Have you been? How do you balance travel whilst leaving a minimal footprint?
Isn’t is beyond beautiful there?? 🥰🏝️. I wish we could go back everytime I think about the Maldives. We were there in 2023 on Rasdhoo island. I don’t remember seeing any garbage wash up but we were much further up the west side of the country on Rasdhoo island so maybe things wash up on the lower islands first? Not sure but I definitely would have been sad to see garbage plastic washing up on those beautiful beaches. We all need to do better. The companies that are producing all these plastics need to do better and stop putting the responsibility on the consumer and passing the buck just by slapping “please recycle” on the side of their containers. #EndRant 🤷🏻♀️😣