The flag carrier of Kazakhstan, Air Astana will be operating direct flights twice a week from Almaty to Maldives (Malé) from 5th December 2020.
The airline will operate flights on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Flights from Almaty to Maldives will be operated by its brand-new Airbus 321LR.
Before the coronavirus crisis, Air Astana operated a network of 60 international and domestic routes from hubs in largest Kazakh city Almaty and Kazakh capital Nur-Sultan. The company suspended most of its flights in March when the first pandemic lockdown was introduced in Kazakhstan.
The route to Maldives comes while the airline revealed that they were considering new destinations in order to appeal to leisure travelers seeking transit-free, point-to-point travel, which has become more popular amid the pandemic.
“At least half a dozen places we flew to before the pandemic, we may never fly there ever again,” Air Astana’s CEO Peter Foster revealed in an interview. “But on the opposite side, there are some places we may fly to that we’ve never flown to in the past. What seems to be becoming very apparent is that people, particularly those travelling on holiday for leisure reasons, do not want to go through hub airports anymore. They don’t want to hang out in large airports or large cities with their families. They want to go to point A to point B, and point B being their final destination.”
To book your flight via Air Astana, visit https://airastana.com/kaz/en-us/Plan/Special-Offers/Flights-to-Maldives
Maldives reopened borders to all nationalities from 15th July 2020. All visitors are granted a 30-day free on-arrival visa with a confirmed booking for a stay at any registered tourist facility in the country.
Maldives has also extended ‘Split Stay’ for all types of tourist accommodation facilities, allowing tourists to split their stay between resort, hotels, guesthouses and live aboard boats, with prior approval as per split-stay procedure and guideline by the Ministry of Tourism.
While there is no mandatory quarantine or testing on arrival, tourists traveling to Maldives are required to complete an online health declaration form and provide a negative PCR test result taken at least 96 hours prior to their departure.
The negative PCR test result must be attached while completing Traveler Health Declaration form, which has to be submitted online via IMUGA (www.imuga.immigration.gov.mv), by all arriving passengers before arrival (but not exceeding 24 hours before arrival time).
