Warning: corny article ahead 🙂
Aside from what we obviously know, luxury is about time, space, intimacy, sustainability, reconnecting, knowledge… Luxury is being able to manage your time in such a way that it ceases to exist. The luxury of creating yourself a space where you can be in harmony with what you are. Of giving you the intimacy necessary to discover yourself. Knowing yourself, embracing yourself. And after your resources have been replenished, then you can afford the luxury of sharing with others what you’ve just learned. 🙂
The experience is what makes your heart skip a beat, spark curiosity in your eyes, let your mind roam freely. It’s what is left after a mixture of things run through you It’s what, if you had to do it all over again, would come in different shapes and colors like a crazy kaleidoscope. When luxury and experience meet you might witness an interesting phenomenon, never seen before, on a beautiful island in the Gulf of Thailand 🙂 I warned you this might get corny, didn’t I?:)
Soneva Kiri is just an hour away from Bangkok, in Koh Kood. An hour and a few minutes by plane. An hour of flying with a Cessna Grand Caravan private jet. Meaning the type of plane I swore myself I’d never step foot in 🙂 Anyways, we took off of Suvarnabhumi Bangkok’s main airport, to Mai Si — Soneva Kiri’s main airport. Because yes, the resort has its own island, its own airport, and its own plane. That the airport is actually a cute house meant to keep shade to its initial is another story. 🙂
The Soneva experience starts at home when your inbox notifies you that you have a new email asking you to choose…. the type of pillow you want to sleep on, your favorite room scent or shower gel scent. What music you’d like to have on your playlist, what diet you’re on or whatever else you can dream on and they can provide for you 🙂
You don’t realize when you get on the plane, you forget you said you’d never step foot in it, you stare at the avalanche of buttons and controls and you almost can’t believe you’re sitting in what is basically a luxury van with pilots instead of drivers. Yes, you’re allowed to laugh cause that’s how it goes when you ride with an “eight seater”: you rejoice like a little kid. As I said, the advantage of flying with a private jet is that everything runs so smoothly that you don’t even realize when you’ve landed on the boat, drinking a cocktail and getting acquainted with your personal Mr. Friday set to be at your beck and call the entire trip 🙂
From Mai Si you are escorted with a buggy during a 5 minute ride to the transfer speed boat, where, after another 5 minutes, you are given your very own personal buggy (ok, let’s give credit where it’s due and agree with Matei when he says they’re very bougie electric golf carts). Our Mr. Friday (or commonly known as a personal butler) was actually a Mrs. named Milk. And don’t think she’s going to be your shadow for the entire trip cause it’s not the case! Very discreet, appropriate presence, morning and evening so you don’t get spoiled rotten 🙂
I want to invite you in but we can’t seem to leave the deck 🙂 There’s just one more thing I’d like to mention, something only a crazy about details resort could have. The welcoming to the resort (as well as the goodbye) is basically a series of rituals meant to initiate you to everything that’s about to go down. Everybody is present, everybody greets you, obviously everyone knows your name, and even more obvious is that they’re there to indulge you 🙂
That was it after a tour of the most important places in the resort (to which we’ll come back soon since we wouldn’t dare to keep only to ourselves the fact that they an all you can eat ice cream, chocolate and cheese place 🙂 ) and Milk turned over our villa. A beautiful seaside view one. Oh, and we forgot to mention that, through some sort of magic sorcery, everything from the moment you board the plane until you board it again smells like lemongrass 🙂
Circling back, the villa was divided into a few key areas: the pool area (with a fridge, chill spot, shower, and whatnot), the bedroom, the dressing and outdoor bathroom (accompanied by its own showers, bathtub and, you guessed it, chill spot). Everything blends in so perfectly and naturally that we more often than not wondered “how come we didn’t think of this? It’s so simple yet has a wow factor to it”. Nothing looks like it was placed at random and clearly, everything is arranged in a way that is 10 steps ahead of you, as if a professional chess player 🙂
And no matter how much we wanted to keep this a neat and tidy article, with designated paragraphs for food, activities and doing everything by the book, we still ended up telling the story as we remember it from the avalanche of beautiful memories we hold from this place. Therefore, what should I serve you first? Salted caramel, an “afternoon tea”, passion fruit or mango?
Mascarpone, yogurt, Thai tea or honey? Meaning over 40 varieties of ice cream that Soneva has to delight their guests between 11 am and 11 pm 🙂 Not cool! So hard to choose! And if you still have room, right next to the ice cream room, there is another room filled with all types of chocolate, nuts and macarons, basically a place of extreme decadence that pushes you slowly to the gym (which I, personally have not visited, but Matei can confirm that it’s top notch 🙂 )
At “The View”, you get fine dining with European dishes created by the hands of a Michelin star chef, fine wines and views to die for. At “the Benz” restaurant (which is located at the exit from the resort) the lady with the same name cooks Thai cuisine. Fine as well, we wouldn’t have it any other way. Meanwhile, at “So Chilled” and “North Beach” you get a more relaxed vibe and more casual dishes while still keepin’ it fresh. 🙂 And at “TreePod” you are offered a “dine in the sky” experience which not only was a first for us, but it was also totally unexpected. From the ground you are boarded to a bamboo “nest” and lifted above the trees for breakfast (or tea, lunch, dinner, depending on what you choose) that is brought to you by a waiter anchored on a zip-line while you enjoy the view safely belted to your seat ( and no, it’s neither dangerous or unstable, but they prefer being safe to being sorry 🙂 )
They even have an outdoor movie theater with popcorn and everything you need which we missed by a hair (it must’ve been a mascarpone ice cream that kept us away 🙂 ) and an observatory that revolves around…the stars 🙂 Not to mention the playground which is huge and would make anyone wander around for hours.
Regarding the activities you can do around here, you just need time to do ‘em all. Thai cuisine cooking lessons (we missed out on Som Tam’s secrets, but we’ll take a raincheck 🙂 ), snorkeling, cruises at sunset or sunrise, wine tasting, waterfalls, trekking, alchemy classes…. It’s a lot, I told you 🙂
More than anything, the most important experience Soneva Kiri has to offer (same as all Soneva resorts in the Maldives) is sustainability. The vegetables are grown inside each resort. They use food waste from their restaurants as fertilizer, mixed with other vegetable waste from the jungle, a mixture that results in organic and fertile soil. The water comes from the islands. There isn’t a hint of plastic in sight. Everything gets recycled and transformed into decorative objects or used for villas maintenance. Solar energy powers all of the buildings. They make their own biofuel and are constantly trying to find solutions to diminish their carbon print from the airplane transport leaves behind. They were the first ones to ban the “infusion” of plastic bottled water on the islands and among the few that care about the environment in a very responsible way and understood that you can’t take without giving something in exchange, and that, once you have discovered certain tricks it’s not ok to keep them to yourself if you care about your surroundings lasting for as long as possible.
One last detail before we cut the “sweetness” short 🙂 Three words: Six Senses Spa … the place you go in a human and come out a superhuman 🙂
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