bucket list

Club Med has been on our holiday bucket list for a while and I’m glad we finally managed to check it out last weekend with all 3 kids. It was a glorious, sunshiney weekend to head to Club Med Bintan, about an hour’s ferry ride out from Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal.

Being the first time we were bringing baby Finn along for a holiday just the two of us (without any additional adult help), we were a little nervy about the adult-kid ratio. Plus there’s my pregnant belly which reduces mobility by about 70%, so it was effectively like 1.5 adults vs 3.5 kids. It’s a good thing Truett and Kirsten are such seasoned travellers, which helped a lot.

One of the best things about Club Med is their system of GO’s (Gentil Organisateur). They’re a bunch of young, energetic and enthusiastic Club Med crew who run all the activities, including the super awesome kids club (Mini Club Med). The Mini Club Med program runs from 8.30 in the morning till 5 in the afternoon (they even eat together) and the kids had such a great time hanging out with their newfound friends and GO’s.

Evidently, we’re big fans of Mini Club Med because that means we get to chill out and take a breather while the kids are off having fun.

While they were at the kids club, they got to try out a whole bunch of really cool activities like the trapeze, trampoline and archery.

I think the trapeze was Tru’s absolute favourite activity. He panicked a little as he started climbing up the ladder but my brave little trooper powered on and took the leap. He made it look so fun that if I wasn’t pregnant, I’d definitely be trying it out myself.

Baby Finn was a little too small to join Mini Club Med unsupervised so he got to spend some quality time with us, which he was thrilled to do. I’ve never seen him look so happy – he was yelling “AWESOME…YES!!!” everywhere he went.

Finally, here’s what happens after a fun-filled day at Mini Club Med.

Ok, only one of these 3 are really sleeping.

Yeah, that one.

*Book a Club Med holiday from now till 30 May (travel from May-Oct 2014) and enjoy the Kids Stay For Free promotion at Bali, Cherating, Phuket and Guilin.

Also, you don’t want to miss the Bintan Family Festival from 5^th to 8^th June, where there’ll be a whole list of exciting activities happening over the span of 4 days, such as a Soccer Clinic with Steven Tan, Child Yoga, Mosaic Art, Eco Arts and Craft, Batik Painting, Ice-Cream Making, K-Pop Dance and Kids Performing. 

Sitting here looking out at the beautiful baby blue ocean and golden sands with my flute of bubbly in hand, I’m certain of one thing, that NIYAMA Resort Maldives by Per Aquum is an unparalleled piece of island paradise.

Nestled on this little atoll is perfection – the  combination of luxury, tranquility and exquisite charm, topped off with the most spectacular view anyone can ever hope to see.

Quite often, you look at amazing photos of a place and when you actually get there, you realise that you have to knock off at least 30% for photoshop skills or great composition. But here, photos don’t even come close to capturing how breathtaking everything is.

Being here feels like a dream I never want to wake up from.

First of all, arriving at NIYAMA Maldives must be done in style, via a seaplane. It’s 45-minute flight out from Male international airport and there’s something so very James Bond about getting on board a seaplane; makes it all feel like a real adventure. It’s one of those things to check off one’s bucket list and I’m glad we did.

Sidenote: it was equal parts cool and terrifying to be 3 feet away from the pilots in the cockpit, which might I add, has no door so we could watch them in action the entire flight. They were working all these levers/buttons like a pro and the whole time I was thinking, “all it takes is just one wrong button and we’re quite literally swimming with the fishes…ALSO DUDE WHY IS THAT RED BUTTON BLINKING FURIOUSLY??!!”

The kids thought it was super awesome, so that’s that.

Once you arrive though, you immediately start to feel all your problems slipping away. We stepped off onto the jetty to a welcome party of friendly staff offering cool towels and a refreshing lime juice for us and a handwritten note with bracelets for the kids.

“How did they know our names?” Kirsten whispered, clearly impressed by all the attention she was getting.

Shortly after, we were whisked off by Ashley, our Thakuru or personal butler (who happens to be from Singapore!!) to a stunning water pavilion with private pool and jacuzzi at number 50, our home for the next couple of days.

It’s a palatial one-bedroom paradise with an adjoining living room that opened up to an infinity pool and a jacuzzi overlooking the shimmering Indian Ocean. The beds were luxuriously soft and fluffy, the living room was equipped with every possible amenity we could want (Nespresso machine, fully-stocked private wine bar, separate fridge, popcorn machine, bubbly on ice, microwave, Bose sound system) and the bathroom was an absolute palace, featuring separate open air shower and toilet areas that gave you a view of the fishes swimming below as you showered. The bathtub was bigger than anything I’ve ever seen, it could fit all four of us with room to spare. Seriously, it was so huge it could fit a baby elephant if it wanted to.

Apart from the spanking new luxurious digs, the hospitality of the staff was the cherry on top of an already decadent, triple-frosted, sugar coated, scrummilicious chocolate fudge cake, so to speak. All the staff we met were so warm and friendly that we felt right at home. Also, their dedication to housekeeping was phenomenal. On our last night, there was a massive thunderstorm as we hopped out for a quick dinner and when we got back, we discovered that they had rushed to spruce up the room even in the crazy storm.

In short, NIYAMA redefines luxury. In fact, it takes what you used to know as luxury and blows it all the way into the stratosphere many times over.

This was the view we woke up to every morning, just endless crystal blue water that disappeared into the sky. It’s hard to imagine life being more perfect than this. I’m hardly a morning person but for a view this spectacular, I was up every morning at 5.45 to catch a glimpse of the morning sun peeking out on the horizon.

As were the kids, who decided that life was infinitely better with early morning pre-breakfast somersaults into the jacuzzi.

Suffice to say, our Maldives experience at NIYAMA turned out to be far better than anything we could have possibly dreamed of. It was the best of days filled with relaxing conversations by the ocean, dreams of pretty sunsets and amazing family time lounging in the pool.

*More to come on the activities and food, stay tuned!

We did lots of fun stuff in NYC but one of the funnest was visiting the Big Apple Circus in Lincoln Center’s Damrosch Park. We don’t have circuses back home and I’ve never been to one but I knew enough about them to know that I’d really love it. In fact, numero uno on my bucket list is to join the circus for a day. Maybe one day I will but for starters, I got to visit a circus so I guess that’s counts for half a bucket list achieved. Sort of?

I hear there’s no better circus for a first visit (or second or third visit) than the Big Apple Circus. It’s a proper circus with that delicious old school charm and a big top and a ringmaster and tightrope walkers and trapeze artists and everything else circuses should have. Including hotdogs and popcorn and lots of candy floss. It ain’t a circus without candy floss, amirite?

All the acts were so, so good. Kirsten’s favourite was Ty Tojo, 15 year old juggler extraordinaire. This guy has mad juggling skillz yo. During the show, I had no idea he was 15(??!!) because he’s insanely talented. At one point, he had 7 balls up in the air at the same time and he caught every last one of them with his 2 tiny 15-year old hands.

All the other acts were equally impressive. Half the time, I was on the edge of my seat trying not to look (because OMG stop all that crazy flinging in the air!!) but at the same time, it was all so fascinating that I couldn’t look away even for a second.

And Truett’s favorite? The Dosov Troupe or as Tru likes to call it, the human catapults. I’ve never seen anything like that in my life. They made it look so effortless as they teeterboarded each other up into the air for backflips and somersaults. It’s the kind of thing one dreams about doing as a kid – having someone flip you up into the air with a giant see-saw.

I can’t believe we actually got to visit a real circus and I loved, loved, loved every single minute of the 2-hour show. I almost wanted to yell for an encore when it ended but the husband told me that’s not how circuses work. People clap and then get up to leave politely. But seriously, this circus should totally do an encore, it’s that good.

*Hat tip to Phil from the Big Apple Circus for the invite and tickets.