When John was diagnosed in 2016 at the age of 54, he was given a 4- 5 year life expectancy.  He set a goal that he would like to reach and celebrate his 60th birthday, which at the time I think we both silently thought may be overly-optimistic, but goals and targets were then, and still are, so important.  Back then when we dreamed of reaching 60 we both expected that John’s health would have deteriorated significantly given the grim prognosis.  Goodness me, how wrong we were! It’s utterly bizarre that John often says that he feels better now than he did pre-diagnosis.  Does that have something to do with exiting the rat-race of high-pressure employment and embracing living life to the full?  Who knows.

You will know from the last blog that we were hopeful that we would finally get to the Maldives for John’s birthday in January, having been cancelled 7 times due to COVID.  Hallelujah and praise the lord – we did it!!  We were given the go-ahead from the consultant who it seems is interested to hear where we have been prior to each of our appointments with her. The night before we departed we were treated to a fabulous recording that Dan put together of friends and family from all around the world sending messages and birthday wishes to John.  It was heart-warming and humbling to see the wonderful messages, which (surprise surprise) made us cry.

We set off for Heathrow on John’s birthday wearing ‘It’s My Birthday’ badges, with our customary optimism hoping for an upgrade to Business Class.  Qatar check-in staff couldn’t really be expected to understand the significance of this trip….we turned right when we got on the plane. It’s a pretty gruelling journey to get there – about 26 hours door-to-door including a change in Doha, then an hours domestic flight in a small propeller plane from Male, (the Madives capital) to Kaadedhdhoo, a tiny airport island in the Gaafu Dhaalu Atoll.  After a 20 minute speedboat trip we arrived at Amari Havodda and really felt like we had returned home to old friends.  We received a warm welcome and recognised many of the staff that were there in 2019, and the fantastic hospitality continued throughout our 12 night stay.  We have such wonderful memories of our previous stay and were slightly concerned that the reality of a return visit may not live up to our expectations, but this certainly was not the case.  The staff are a credit to the resort and could not do enough for us.  We enjoyed fabulous food, thanks to extra-special attention from the wonderful head chef Rakesh.  We snorkelled every day and were fortunate enough to swim with many sharks, rays, turtles, octopus and a vast array of beautiful tropical fish.  There are encouraging signs that the reef is looking healthier with some colour returning to the terribly bleached corals.   An advantage of visiting an island which is so far away from the capital is that it is incredibly peaceful with no planes overhead, or noise from neighbouring islands, and very little pollution.  The sea is pristine and when the wind and tide is calm is feels like swimming in an aquarium.  Staff on the island are passionate about protecting the environment and are seen daily sweeping the beaches of debris.  Sadly, on most days we still picked up a number of plastic bottles, wrappers, glass, and broken floor/wall tiles which will have come from far away, and only washed up on the pristine shores when the tide decided it was the right time to deposit them.  It did make me feel ashamed of how we treat the planet, and how people have such disregard for nature and the impact of their actions.   We try to do our bit, but with our renewed love of travel I do wrestle with the guilt of our increased air miles, but for now I don’t have an answer.  So we’ll continue to wrestle with our conscience whilst enjoying life to the full with our holidays, and act as responsibly as we can.

Sunrise at Amari Havodda

It does now feel like we are coming through the last two years of COVID madness that has put all of our plans on hold.  It’s been difficult for us knowing that we have a limited amount of time to have been in forced lockdown for two years. It’s now all systems go and we’ve got lots of trips, visits and overdue meet-ups with family and friends in the calendar for 2022. Bring it on!

John has put together a video of our trip to Amari Havodda which you can see, below.   It’s 15 minutes long so pour yourself a Pina Colada, put your sunnies on and soak up some of the atmosphere and sunshine that we enjoyed so much.