I booked to stay 4 nights at Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru through the specialist tour operator Turquoise Holidays.  When I was looking for a Maldives resort I was bewildered by the number of places which all looked terrific, so I felt I needed an expert to guide me.  I gave them a list of “must haves”, they proposed a handful, from which I selected Landaa Giraavaru. Landaa’s website, its online reviews and its reputation among prominent travel magazines were all very enticing, so I accepted the rather high price of just shy of £10,000 for a four night stay, half board.  I hoped this would be a big step up from the first part of my holiday, to Park Hyatt Maldives, also for 4 nights, but at a third of the price of Landaa.  Unfortunately I was disappointed.

We got to Landaa Giraavaru by seaplane from Male. Flight bookings are arranged by the resort and the cost is included in your bill. The plane moors to a pontoon a couple of hundred metres offshore and a hotel speedboat ferried us to the resort’s main jetty.

My heart was already sinking because the resort seemed a lot bigger and busier than the one we’d just come from. Nonetheless the reception area was open and airy and rather impressive.   It included a comfortable seating area and a complimentary drinks station (which we saw throughout the resort) offering us iced peach tea, water, or regular teas and coffees. This was a really nice touch; It was very hot and humid when we were there, and to be able to quench the thirst while out and about, without needing to sit down in a bar area, was very welcome during our stay!

After our check in we were driven in an electric buggy to our “Sunset Villa”; an overwater villa on the side of a jetty which sees the sun set. Four Seasons also has “sunrise villas” at a slightly lower price, which are just on the other side of the same jetty.  I’m not convinced I valued the (angled) sunset view from the room. I was often out enjoying the sunset from a bar!

I thought the villa was wonderful!  It was very spacious at 86m2, plus a large multi-level sun deck with loungers, a double day bed (plus an upstairs open day bed) and a netted area, all sitting above a beautiful turquoise shallow ocean lagoon where occasional quite large and colourful fish can be viewed swimming.  BUT, and for me it was a very big BUT, upon entering the water to snorkel one instantly sees that this lagoon is a sand and dead coral-strewn desert!  I’d been expecting to pass my days snorkelling over beautiful corals and a multitude of brightly coloured fish. They told me that warm waters associated with the 2016 El Nino had bleached (and killed) “all of the coral in the Maldives”, though of course I knew this to be untrue because the snorkelling at the Park Hyatt Hadahaa, was superb!

Inside, the villa was wonderful (but I heard they’re actually giving them a refurb very soon).  A double height beamed roof covered distinct living and bed-rooms.  The mock 4-poster bed was wide and super-comfortable, with its incredibly thick mattress and there were plenty of comfortable spots to sit down on.

Off the bedroom was a walk-in wardrobe area with loads of space for our clothes; something I rate as quite important, but it’s so often overlooked by hotels!  This space was far greater than what we needed, because we had been very careful to meet the 20Kg baggage allowance on the seaplane.  BTW we saw (probably the majority of) other guests checking in and out with large hard-sided suitcases; I don’t know if they got charged extra, or if they were reprimanded.

The bathroom was a good size, with two wash-basins, a step-free shower cubicle big enough for two, and a long bathtub. Again this was big enough for two, but they only had a padded head rest at one end.  And then there was the outside shower area, surrounded by coral stonework.  The toiletries were unbranded but nice and they were topped up daily, and the towels were soft and fluffy (in the good way) and plentiful in availability.

Perhaps most eye-catching was the toilet space, which had a glass panel on the floor so one could admire the fish below!  On my last morning a young lemon shark swam below me; how cool is that?!

It’s worth noting that everything in the room worked properly, from the TV, the aircon, the lighting, to the plumbing, we didn’t see any insects and everything was spotlessly clean.

The Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru has 4 restaurants but we only visited one of them: Blu.  We went on our first night because it was closest to our villa, and we ended up having every breakfast and every diner there because the food was so good!

At Blu breakfast is an a la carte affair. I was fully satisfied with a large bowl of granola and berries, coffee and pastries, each day. Plus a freshly squeezed juice (watermelon was great).  At dinnertime Blu is an Italian fine dining restaurant, where the Italian Head Chef gets the chance to show off his skills.

For dinner we loved the tartare of tuna and also of beef to start, the pastas and risotti were top quality, and the main courses were all excellent, but our favourite was the beef fillet with a hugely generous slice of foie gras on top!

Blu is worthy of a restaurant review in its own right (and I would have scored it 9/10), but I chose not to take notes during our terrific dinners.  The serving staff were all very pleasant, knowledgable and professional.  We found the Japanese maitre d’ named Tamayo to be particularly friendly and helpful, but all of her team were very good.

The restaurant is styled in white wood, it’s open-sided, spacious and sits on stilts right above the lagoon. At breakfast time lots of fish hang around in the hope of getting some pastry crumbs, and young sharks swim past to check out the fish. The Blu bar has a ‘colony club’ feel and the barmen are warm and very good fun. Sunset cocktails here simply must be part of your day’s schedule!  Between the bar and the restaurant is a swimming pool which has sparkling lights at night, and next door is the Watersports centre, from where diving excursions depart.

We went on one such ‘excursion’ on our 2nd day;  a “flight” on the world’s first 3-person submarine.  It’s an expensive treat at nearly $1000/person for an hour’s dive over the reef, but this super machine cost $2m, so the price is comparable with helicopter sight-seeing flights.  We were given a thorough safety briefing before we submerged into the ocean; it was so exciting!

But my excitement turned to frustration when we submerged, because that’s when I realised the water visibility wasn’t very good (because of plankton), and I saw that the glass dome I was looking out of made all the fish appear to be a tiny fraction of their true size.  The pilot told us he couldn’t take us on his normal route, because of the poor visibility, so we spent 45 minutes going round and round a single coral outcrop.  The deepest we went was 30m. I expressed my dissatisfaction to the resort manager at his cocktail reception that evening. The submarine is operated by a separate company, DeepFlight Adventures, but he was able to persuade them to give me a 50% discount, which was very welcome indeed.

Close to the arrivals jetty is the resort’s Marine Discovery Centre. Inside the dark and mysterious looking building there are tanks filled with local fish and lots of information about them and the local corals is at hand. Out back is a turtle rehabilitation centre, where they look after turtles rescued after being caught in fisherman’s nets.  One day we witnessed a turtle being released back into the ocean!

On the other side of the centre, between the beach and the arrivals jetty, is a patch of water containing a coral garden – pieces of coral attached to metal frames. This small patch of water with steel clothes horses was said to be the best snorkelling spot on Landaa!  Maybe for first-timers.  But this small lagoon did have some interesting visitors; baby black-tipped reef sharks, about 75cm long, patrolled schools of baitfish right in the shallows, and grey herons stood on the sand fishing too. Just the other side of a jetty is the over-water Al Barakat, Landaa’s Middle Eastern restaurant.  We discovered that juvenile reef sharks (about 1.3m) congregated in the shade beneath the restaurant, and we thoroughly enjoyed swimming with them. (They’re quite shy and stay a few metres away from you).

The resort provides boat trips to better snorkelling sites, but they’re around $100/person and you get an hour in the water. I complained to my tour operator that this was an unwelcome charge, when I was paying £2500/night to stay on an island which I thought had a great house reef. So they arranged for us to have a trip for free.  Even though we were only in the water for 45 minutes, this guided snorkel over a neighbouring islet’s reef was excellent!  We came across turtles – 5 of them in total – and saw lots of other species as wells as hard and soft corals.

We only found time for one visit to the Spa during our stay, but I wish I’d looked at their ‘menu’ earlier, because there were several therapies I would have liked to have tried. In particular they major on Ayurvedic treatments, and they have genuine Keralan therapists delivering it too.

We were taken to an over-water spa villa which had perfect changing/shower/steam room facilities, and a treatment room with two beds positioned above glass panels so we could watch fish as we were massaged!  It was a beautiful setting, but I felt a bit too hot because the spa villa wasn’t air conditioned.  I’m embarrassed that I wrote that! I sound so First World! I’m just saying it was very warm and humid out there and I had a perspiration problem that afternoon.

One of the most impressive and unique things at Landaa is the nightly feeding of sharks from the SeaBar jetty!  At 10pm someone throws slices of fish into the illuminated water, where several large sting-rays and adult (2m long) reef and nurse sharks have gathered expectantly.  There then follows a 5 minute feeding frenzy watched by enthralled resort guests, which I found totally awesome.

Reaching a conclusion to my review of Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru is tough. Our villa was spot on, food was the best I’ve ever had at a holiday resort, some of our marine encounters were fabulous, the spa was very good, and staff service was excellent throughout.  But my main reason for going to Landaa was to spend my days snorkelling on an amazing house reef, which just didn’t happen and I ended up spending a couple of afternoons in the villa watching Netflix!  (note wifi is free, but fast wifi, to avoid buffering, requires a supplement.). This was the most I’ve spent on a hotel room, but in terms of value for money of the overall holiday I was not best pleased, and so, I would not return to this resort.  5/10. Had there been a house reef like at the Park Hyatt I would have scored 10

We were there during the Easter school holidays and there were several British families. I can appreciate that this resort would be great for young families, and anyone who isn’t fixated on world class snorkelling.  But it is expensive, though our villa was capable of sleeping a family, which keeps costs down somewhat.