We stayed at JA Manafaru for 4 days and had a wonderful time there. All the staff were courteous and treated us so well. On arrival, we were taken on a tour around the island and our villa. Our concierge was always reachable on WhatsApp and shared details on all the activities being offered on the island in addition to helping us with the bookings for all the restaurants / activities. The room and pool were extremely clean and cozy, the amenities were top quality as well. There is a table and chair for if you want to work and a separate sitting area if you wanted to sit around and watch TV. For us, the food was easily the best part of the trip; we were blown away by the taste of the food offered and quality of the ingredients used at the restaurants. We spent most of our day dining at Kakuni and Ocean Grill. We loved the Tempura Coconut Prawns, Dragon, Nasi Goreng, Hot basil and chili seafood, Homemade Belgian/Vanilla Ice cream, Toffee Date Pudding, Grilled Maldivian Octopus and the bread they serve us while we waited for our meals. The food brought back memories of my childhood, JA Manafaru has inspired me to be a better cook; the food is that good. As for the location, there's several advantages for it being a more remote location (It's the northernmost resort!), the beaches and waters are pristine, you will not see commercial vessels around you, there is zero sound and light pollution, the night sky was lit up from all the stars and we were even able to see the milky way! We will definitely be visiting JA Manafaru again!…
This was our very first vacation too the Maldives so it was a particularly difficult decision in choosing a resort . J A Manafaru was an excellent choice we found. Yes it’s a difficult destination to reach, but just think of it as a few extra hours of travelling!! Not much on a couple of weeks!! We had booked a Sunrise water Villa as far out on the jetty as possible and that’s just what we were given, ( room 539) On arrival we were met by our host concierge Majda a young helpful and most caring young lady who spent the next two weeks checking and arranging for us which we were most grateful. The island was particularly quiet which made the long travel so worth while, with deserted beaches and most attentive staff in all areas. Mentioning staff, all were so friendly and enjoyed interaction giving history, climatic information or talking of life in the Maldives. You never felt rushed which we appreciated. It was mostly extremely hot, just changing seasons, so the plunge pool was most welcome. The Water Villa was the perfect spot for spotting numerous fish large , small and colourful. Also, we daily watched turtles in front of our Villa and most days pods of dolphins or the occasional nurse shark ( harmless as no teeth) All in all a great destination with excellent food, accommodation and attention to detail from the management. There have been a few references about the transfers. I have to say that we were really impressed on our departure how we were escorted and taken care of at both airports particularly at Male, guided all the way too the checkin desk. Yes, we recommend a visit. Thank you Karen, Majda and all the wonderful friendly staff bringing us food and plenty of wine and refreshments.…
We went for our dream honeymoon and couldn't be happier with our experience. Everything exceeded our expectations! If you are scuba diver this is the place for you because the house reef at the resort is off the charts!!! Our dive master Diana was very knowledgeable about the marine life and she and the boat crew helped us have excellent and memorable diving experiences. So much variety to see! The wait staff including Hassan and service staff connected well with us to make our dining and other experiences and excursions amazing. They were professional and kind. The food was incredible and the chefs, including Jeseep and Moosa catered to my wife's dietary restrictions which helped her to feel her best. Our experience concierge, Hasan, was dedicated to the details and communicated well with us. We felt very connected to the staff and are grateful to all for making our honeymoon a fantastic experience. Thank you!…
Everything was great, probably the best experience in Maldives so far. We enjoyed a ten days stay in a beach villa in May. The staff was very friendly and helpful, trying to satisfy all requests with a smile. The food was very good and the SPA even better. Thank you all at JA Manafaru for our holiday!
Everything was almost to perfection, the only comment I can make which we were told they are working on is the domestic transportation scheduling. The time slots are very limited and in order for us to make our flight we had to wake up at 2am to take the boat trip and then wait for an hour for the domestic flight to make it to the international airport. Other than that the whole experience was amazing, the activities offered are not very limited and our scuba instructor from Best Dive, Tibo was absolutely amazing and professional, I highly recommend taking the scuba experience with him as he made my wife and I's first scuba diving and unreal experience.
The booking process was horrible. Many missed and incorrect information, unreturned calls, and a lot of delays in getting confirmation with the booking. I booked 3 weeks in advance and only got the confirmation of booking less than 4 days before the trip, this included the confirmation for the domestic flight. I have fully documented all my correspondence in emails to show as proof. I can provide the names of all the reservation staff that I was communicating with. When we arrived at the resort, the host informed us that it was a bed and breakfast deal we booked, although in my booking (and I HAD TO SHOW proof) we booked an all-inclusive package!. This clearly showed another miscommunication between staff/ booking team of JA Manafaru. The worst mess-up was we were informed that they couldnt get us in a domestic flight to Male on our supposed departure date from the resort. The reason was the flights were full and we should have had provided our domestic flight schedule 7 days before according to the staff. But we were not be able to do that simply because the JA Manafaru team only confirmed our domestic flight less than 4 days before the trip! (again I have full documentation and email to prove this). This resulted in us having to cancel our Emirates flight going Male-Dubai and had to buy a new one with another airline just so we could get home to Dubai on time. We stayed an extra night and spent USD 2k extra on the flights.…
Where do I start?! We visited as a family of 3 on our long awaited honeymoon. The sunset water villa was incredible. The views were breathtaking and the villa had everything you would want. We did request an iron which was left in the room for us to use as we needed for the rest of the stay, which was appreciated. Food: absolutely fabulous. Everything was so fresh and fantastically cooked. My daughter, age 9 with a milk allergy, was well catered for. In fact, she was asked daily what she preferred and was always accommodated for. Everything is so well thought through. The games room is well equipped and spotless. There was so many extra little touches that made the holiday even more special. My daughter particularly loved scouring for hours trying to find hidden bottles hidden by the resort. Bikes are provided in your villa, in which we loved to use. Snorkelling equipment was free to hire and immaculate. The staff are just the most caring, professional and fun people we have met. We genuinely are missing them whilst back at home. We are hoping to be back for Easter 2023 and hopefully everything will be just as perfect as it was this year. …
JA Manafaru is beautiful island with an incredible house reef. The snorkelling was fabulous and equipment all complimentary. We took a Scuba Diving excursion which was such a great experience. The service was second to none with all staff really making a genuine effort to please. The food was also delicious with a buffet style breakfast and different options to eat for lunch and dinner. We particularly enjoyed the Easter journey event put on by Karen and her team which was great fun for all. We stayed in a overwater villa which was of a good size and clean with great housekeeping, the infinity pool was great and the snorkelling from the villa was also great. Our host Imran was fabulous, available via WhatsApp and booked all our dining and trips for us. He was an excellent host and his impeccable service really made the holiday stand out. A real nice touch was to meet all of the team when we arrived in the resort and have a tour of the island. All of the management team made a great effort to chat with us about there journeys & were in no rush to move on. The bikes were also a great idea and a great to see the reduced use of buggy’s. The only downside is the timing of our inbound flight (EK658) which meant it took 8 hours from leaving Male arrivals to arriving to JA Manafaru. 8 hours to travel 320km is something which would put us off coming again although we soon forgot about this when we started our holiday at the resort. The outbound flight tied up a lot better (EK657). If the seaplanes were used again we would definitely be a lot more eager to come back. All in all a fabulous holiday.…
This is an incredible island. The villas are beautiful, the food is out of this world and the staff were so helpful particularly with our children. Whilst there is no kids club, you can still use all the kids club facilities. There is a games room, lots of swimming pools and the snorkelling is excellent even with young kids. It was an amazing holiday.
We so wanted to give this hotel a 5* rating, as had been really looking forward to it based on the amazing reviews on TA. However…… we’re hovering between 3 and 4* having experienced the reality. Firstly - the positives, and they are many! The island is beautiful - as expected with soft white sand and beautiful azure seas. Lots of vegetation giving shade (although more humid as the wind doesn’t penetrate so much). Lots of interesting little areas in the trees - can imagine kids having a great time looking for the island chickens in the undergrowth! Our villa was amazing - and a huge thanks to the resort for upgrading us to a water villa from our original booking. Having once tried it, it will be water villas all the way for us in the future. Amazing breeze to keep me cool, and could spend hours watching for the many varieties of marine life (dolphins, fish, rays, sharks, turtles etc) despite neither of us being swimmers/snorkellers. The service in the villa was excellent - everything kept beautifully clean, mini-bar topped up promptly and they adjusted the contents to suit our preference a little more. Nice environmentally friendly touches too (a big thing for the hotel, which was great to see). The food is mostly excellent - the couple of items which didn’t land well probably more to do with personal taste than anything. Good selection at breakfast - no buffet, which we really preferred! Loved the breakfast ‘shooters’ - a healthy little shot of juice and spices. We ate lunch at Andiamo most days - again a good selection, plus tasty new paninis. Evenings were split across Kakuni and the Ocean Grill. As I don’t like fish (I know…. In the Maldives too!), the selections were slightly less and esp. at the grill, I did go back to the same item multiple times. Cooking and presentation all good. Good selection of wine too. Yummy deserts, including cake of the day in Kakuni. On the not-so-good side….. it really comes down to the standard of service offered. Don’t get me wrong, the staff are lovely. So friendly and wanting to do the right thing. But we couldn’t really see that anyone was ‘in charge’ in the restaurants, and many staff didn’t seem too experienced. We felt that everyone was responsible for doing everything, which sometimes meant that nothing was the outcome. A couple of breakfasts we waited a loooong time for someone to take the order, needing me to eventually go and ask a waiter to take our order. Also most days saw a waiter turn up at random tables with a breakfast order which wasn’t theirs. It appeared that something as basic as table-numbering was not in place? We did speak with one of the (?)managers late in our holiday (only junior staff seemed to wear name badges routinely - those who seemed to be resort management didn’t?). They had just introduced a hostess who would check that reservations had been made, and direct the staff a bit more (sadly, our villa host hadn’t actually booked our table that evening - despite telling us on WApp that he had). The manager said they were starting to assign staff to specific areas and/or roles in the restaurants, as guest feedback indicated this was an area for improvement - we said we agreed with this. Hopefully these early steps will lead to overall quality improvement. And so to the villa host - in the past, we find we don’t really use one except for restaurant bookings (which we’d honestly be happy to do ourselves with the venue or via reception/guest relations). JAM hosts are available by WhatsApp which suits us well. However unlike other venues we’ve been too, that seemed to be the only way our host communicated. We saw other guests chatting with their hosts at e.g. breakfast, but we only saw ours by chance occasionally when he was on his buggy going out to the villas. On the last day, he was late for the designated pickup time for us, leading us to start walking as we didn’t want to miss the departure. He also hadn’t confirmed our booking at the clinic for departure checks (despite saying he had), and gave wrong advice on whether there would be a charge for a (resort-led) change in departure method. These little issues just left a poor impression of what should be a 5* service offering for the resort. The negatives are all relatively small things - hence I’ve given a 4* rating. But at a resort like JAM which is (let’s face it) not inexpensive, and brands itself as a luxury resort - service needs to be tip-top. And for us, it wasn’t up to the standard of the other luxury resort & hotels we’ve been lucky enough to visit around the world. However - it shouldn’t take much to improve to the next level. We did see Karen early on in our stay, but not again before we left, otherwise would have been happy to share our views in-person. A huge thanks to all the resort staff who made our visit memorable. We didn’t manage to get all names, but Nafil, Mors, Isse, Shaad, Upul, Oscar, Vasli and Putu were frequently in the frame with their smiles and jokes!…
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