I really did not know what to expect from the Maldives, as I had never been there before, other than there are a lot of posh resorts on a number of islands. The Republic of Maldives is a chain of around 1200 islands stretching 750km across the Indian Ocean. Apparently the exact number of islands varies according to the season and method of classification - the islands come ad go depending on the wind, waves and currents.
The islands are geographically grouped into ring shaped reefs called "atolls" and there are 26 atolls. An atoll encloses a central lagon with a flat, sandy botom at a relatively shallow depth of 40-100m. The outer reef, which forms many of the islands, is often broken by deep channels which allow oceanic water to flow into and outof the central lagoon. Inside the atoll there are numerous smaller ring shaped reefs and tillas.
Of the 1200 islands, only 200 are inhabited by local Maldivians and over 90 islands have been developed as tourist resorts or inhabited by locals and the Government has ruled that there can be no combination of the two. The Government has granted new licences to islands and many of these are under construction. It is expected that an additional 30 new resort islands will be built in the next two or three years.
Not much is known about the early history ofthe island people but the language and some archaeological finds of Buddhist relics indicate that the early settlers were fom the southern Indian continent and the Buddhist Singalese from Sri Lanka. The current 240,000 population is entirely Muslim, after Islam was adopted in 1153 after the visit of a Muslim saint. Between 1513 and 1649, the Portuguese made many failed attemps to take Male, the capital. The first survey of the islands was undertaken in 1835 by the British Admiralty under the command of Robert Moresby and the country was gien the status of a protected state in 1887. Entry ino the United Nations was given in 1965 and in 1976, the British completely withdrew all forces from the South of the country.
My home for the week was the Sea Spirit liveaboard operated by Madives Scuba Tours, an English company. My friend Julie, who lives in Amsterdam and whom I learned to dive with met me out there and was my buddy. On a typical day we had the first dive at 7am, then breakfast, the second dive at round noon, then lunch and the final dive in the afternoon. Neither of us knew what to expect from the diving and after the first two dives when we didn't see that much, we both started to think that the Maldives was not living up to its expectations. Things got better over the next few dives. We saw loads of sharks (hammerheads, grey and white tipped reef sharks), turtles, moray eels, eagle and other rays and the usual tropical fish. There is some rather spectacular table coral. A lot of the coral was decimated as a result of El Nino in 1999 but the recovery of the coral has been very quick and has been completely regenerated.
February is the time of year when a lot of manta rays can be spotted but over the last few weeks the current has not been flowing as expected (it usually travels from East to West but it is now travelling from North to South through the atolls), such that mantas are being spotted where they are not normally found at this time of year and they are absent from the usual sights. Julie and I had almost resigned ourselves by Wednesday that we would not see any of these magnificent creatures but by the second dive that day a huge female came gliding along like a Boeing 747. We were diving near the manta cleaning station but after checking us out, it decided to carry on into the ocean. We were very excited indeed and were lucky to spot another manta on our last dive on Saturday morning.
We had a very special night dive earlier in the week when we saw about 12 white tipped reef sharks and a giant barracuda (Erasmus) about 1.5 metres long. A few times I tried to peer at something lying on the reef floor and when I moved to look a few inches away, the bloody great barracuda was right in my face. I was diving with one of the guys who had a really bright torch, so the barracuda and sharks kept following us, to use the light for hunting fish. A couple of times I held onto my buddy for dear life and he kept peering at me as if I had gone mad!
The Maldives are also known for their strong currents and some of the reefs were certainly challenging. On Thursday, Anne-Marie, our dive instructor gave us a briefing on a dive which was known as "The Swirling Vortex of Terror", due to a whirlpool about 100 metres after the drop off site. We were told to stay below 20 metres to avoid it, otherwise we would suffer the washing machine effect andfind ourselves going from 20 metres to being spat out at the surface (at which point you should immediately descend and carry on with your decompression stops).
We descended to 28m metres and hooked in on the reef to watch the action but the current was raging quite a bit, such that I got neck ache every time I turned my neck 90 degrees to see what was floating out in the blue (sharks and rays). After about 5 minutes, Julie and I unhooked ourselves to carry on the dive, hoping that the current would ease off. We drifted around the corner and suddenly found ourselves in a downcurrent away from th reef. I looked at my dive computer and the depth gauge was showing 25m, 26m, 27m, 28m and 29m. We were both finning as if our lives depended on it but we were still sinking. Luckily one of the guys on the boat had told Julie the night before that he knew someone you was caught up in a down current when the tsunami happened and he inflated his BCD. A little voice told her that air in BCD would be a good idea and she then signalled me to do the same. I think I must have put a large gust of air in my BCD and shot up, at which point my dive computer told me to SLOW a number of times. We seemed to yo you a bit and when we levelled out at 19m, we aborted the dive. We came to the surface quite shaken, wondering where we had gone wrong.
When the rest of our group came up, we found out we had all had the same problem - luckily, though, we had missed the whirlpool but others had got caught up in it. Our dive instructors apologised profusely and said that they had never currentl like that in that dive before and that if they had known what it would be like, we would not have dived it. It is a very popular site and several other boats had dived it. Thankfully all our group (most of whom were experienced divers) emerged shaken but unscathed. We put it down to a good learning experience, glad that it hadn't been worse.
On Saturday afternoon, after the last dive of the day, I went to have a look at Male. There is a fish market and a fruit market and I found the local ice cream parlour. Other than that, Male is pretty uninspiring and the souvenir shops sell souvenirs which come from Thailand, but at five times the price.
On Sunday morning I flew to Dubai, where I am currently with my parents (and have finally managed to update my blog, although more photos to follow). I was a bit sad to leave, as it finally dawned on me that I will be home in less than a week. I have had a really fab trip but it has gone by quite quickly. I will be glad to see Vernon and everyone else but also to get back to work as I have spent up! As you will notice from my blog, I have shopped till I dropped and I imagine this will continue in Dubai. Most people know that I love my jewellery and I hadn't even been in Dubai for 24 hours before I made my first purchase. Some diamonds!! Still, a girl has to spoil herself once in a while.............
The islands are geographically grouped into ring shaped reefs called "atolls" and there are 26 atolls. An atoll encloses a central lagon with a flat, sandy botom at a relatively shallow depth of 40-100m. The outer reef, which forms many of the islands, is often broken by deep channels which allow oceanic water to flow into and outof the central lagoon. Inside the atoll there are numerous smaller ring shaped reefs and tillas.
Of the 1200 islands, only 200 are inhabited by local Maldivians and over 90 islands have been developed as tourist resorts or inhabited by locals and the Government has ruled that there can be no combination of the two. The Government has granted new licences to islands and many of these are under construction. It is expected that an additional 30 new resort islands will be built in the next two or three years.
Not much is known about the early history ofthe island people but the language and some archaeological finds of Buddhist relics indicate that the early settlers were fom the southern Indian continent and the Buddhist Singalese from Sri Lanka. The current 240,000 population is entirely Muslim, after Islam was adopted in 1153 after the visit of a Muslim saint. Between 1513 and 1649, the Portuguese made many failed attemps to take Male, the capital. The first survey of the islands was undertaken in 1835 by the British Admiralty under the command of Robert Moresby and the country was gien the status of a protected state in 1887. Entry ino the United Nations was given in 1965 and in 1976, the British completely withdrew all forces from the South of the country.
My home for the week was the Sea Spirit liveaboard operated by Madives Scuba Tours, an English company. My friend Julie, who lives in Amsterdam and whom I learned to dive with met me out there and was my buddy. On a typical day we had the first dive at 7am, then breakfast, the second dive at round noon, then lunch and the final dive in the afternoon. Neither of us knew what to expect from the diving and after the first two dives when we didn't see that much, we both started to think that the Maldives was not living up to its expectations. Things got better over the next few dives. We saw loads of sharks (hammerheads, grey and white tipped reef sharks), turtles, moray eels, eagle and other rays and the usual tropical fish. There is some rather spectacular table coral. A lot of the coral was decimated as a result of El Nino in 1999 but the recovery of the coral has been very quick and has been completely regenerated.
February is the time of year when a lot of manta rays can be spotted but over the last few weeks the current has not been flowing as expected (it usually travels from East to West but it is now travelling from North to South through the atolls), such that mantas are being spotted where they are not normally found at this time of year and they are absent from the usual sights. Julie and I had almost resigned ourselves by Wednesday that we would not see any of these magnificent creatures but by the second dive that day a huge female came gliding along like a Boeing 747. We were diving near the manta cleaning station but after checking us out, it decided to carry on into the ocean. We were very excited indeed and were lucky to spot another manta on our last dive on Saturday morning.
We had a very special night dive earlier in the week when we saw about 12 white tipped reef sharks and a giant barracuda (Erasmus) about 1.5 metres long. A few times I tried to peer at something lying on the reef floor and when I moved to look a few inches away, the bloody great barracuda was right in my face. I was diving with one of the guys who had a really bright torch, so the barracuda and sharks kept following us, to use the light for hunting fish. A couple of times I held onto my buddy for dear life and he kept peering at me as if I had gone mad!
The Maldives are also known for their strong currents and some of the reefs were certainly challenging. On Thursday, Anne-Marie, our dive instructor gave us a briefing on a dive which was known as "The Swirling Vortex of Terror", due to a whirlpool about 100 metres after the drop off site. We were told to stay below 20 metres to avoid it, otherwise we would suffer the washing machine effect andfind ourselves going from 20 metres to being spat out at the surface (at which point you should immediately descend and carry on with your decompression stops).
We descended to 28m metres and hooked in on the reef to watch the action but the current was raging quite a bit, such that I got neck ache every time I turned my neck 90 degrees to see what was floating out in the blue (sharks and rays). After about 5 minutes, Julie and I unhooked ourselves to carry on the dive, hoping that the current would ease off. We drifted around the corner and suddenly found ourselves in a downcurrent away from th reef. I looked at my dive computer and the depth gauge was showing 25m, 26m, 27m, 28m and 29m. We were both finning as if our lives depended on it but we were still sinking. Luckily one of the guys on the boat had told Julie the night before that he knew someone you was caught up in a down current when the tsunami happened and he inflated his BCD. A little voice told her that air in BCD would be a good idea and she then signalled me to do the same. I think I must have put a large gust of air in my BCD and shot up, at which point my dive computer told me to SLOW a number of times. We seemed to yo you a bit and when we levelled out at 19m, we aborted the dive. We came to the surface quite shaken, wondering where we had gone wrong.
When the rest of our group came up, we found out we had all had the same problem - luckily, though, we had missed the whirlpool but others had got caught up in it. Our dive instructors apologised profusely and said that they had never currentl like that in that dive before and that if they had known what it would be like, we would not have dived it. It is a very popular site and several other boats had dived it. Thankfully all our group (most of whom were experienced divers) emerged shaken but unscathed. We put it down to a good learning experience, glad that it hadn't been worse.
On Saturday afternoon, after the last dive of the day, I went to have a look at Male. There is a fish market and a fruit market and I found the local ice cream parlour. Other than that, Male is pretty uninspiring and the souvenir shops sell souvenirs which come from Thailand, but at five times the price.
On Sunday morning I flew to Dubai, where I am currently with my parents (and have finally managed to update my blog, although more photos to follow). I was a bit sad to leave, as it finally dawned on me that I will be home in less than a week. I have had a really fab trip but it has gone by quite quickly. I will be glad to see Vernon and everyone else but also to get back to work as I have spent up! As you will notice from my blog, I have shopped till I dropped and I imagine this will continue in Dubai. Most people know that I love my jewellery and I hadn't even been in Dubai for 24 hours before I made my first purchase. Some diamonds!! Still, a girl has to spoil herself once in a while.............
Pictures above as follows (from left to right):
1. One of the many islands in the Maldives
2. Our liveaboard, the Sea Queen
3. Sunset from an uninhabited island
4. Vew towards Male, the capital
5. Hawkesbill turtle
6. Table coral
7. Two giant moray eels
8. Manta ray
9. Bearded scorpion fish
10. Clown triggerfish (with spots) and red toothed triggerfish (blue one)
11. Two clownfish (Nemo)
12. Reef octopus
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