Posted by Ken Kurtis on April 11, 2002 at 00:37:38:
(Ken Kurtis led the Reef Seekers trip to the Maldives March 3-17. This was Ken’s
second trip, having been there in 1996 as well. Here’s his report.)
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I was definitely looking forward to my return to the Maldives for a number of
reasons. First, I’m attracted to the idea that it’s pretty remote (roughly 300 miles
SSW of the tip of India, in the Indian Ocean). Second, I’d had a great trip there in
1996 and wanted to see how it had changed, especially in light of the coral
bleaching that occurred in the Maldives in 1998. And third, I was very interested
to see what it would be like as an American traveling to a Muslim country in these
post 9/11 times.
The travel part was relatively easy. As long as you ignore the fact that it takes
forever to get there -14 hours LA to Tapei, an hour in Taipei, then 4 hours to
Singapore, a day and a half in Singapore (done deliberately so we could enjoy this
fabulous city - the Singapore Zoo is a must-see), and then another 4 hours
Singapore to the Maldives. But in general terms, the increased security measures
weren’t too bad. Things were slowest in LA (it took us a little over an hour to get
checked in at Singapore Airlines and then snake through the security checkpoint)
but pretty smooth and efficient at most of the other airports, which have always
had more stringent and through security than American airports, so they’ve got the
drill down pat.
And I must say at the outset that no matter where we were, we were warmly
received. There were no anti-American comments or anything like that. And it
was interesting seeing the post 9/11 world through non-American eyes. But this
isn’t politics, it’s a dive report, so let’s get on to it.
Singapore Airlines, as always, was an absolute pleasure to fly. The planes are on
time, the flight attendants are pleasant and courteous, the food is good, the movies
plentiful, and they make an arduous journey as easy as possible.
Our group consisted of seven: Kevin Brooks, Richard Craft, Jay Wilson, Bruce
Graham, Vick Thomas, Elisabeth Sykes, and myself. We would be joined on the
boat by four other divers who had booked directly with the boat.
Just arriving in the Maldives is interesting, because the Malé (pronounced
MAH-lee) airport is built on a small island and the only way off is by boat. So you
gather your bags and walk out of this modern airport not to a taxi stand, but to a
pier where there are dozens of boats waiting to take the deplaning passengers to
their final destinations. After about a 30-minute ride, we arrived at the Manthiri,
our home for the next ten days.
It was certainly nice to see old friends again. I’d had a terrific time with lead
divemaster Manik and was looking forward to exploring the depths with him
again. The same went for instructor/divemaster Moosa (who also serves as photo
pro) who was just working on his DM credentials in ‘96, but who is now a
full-blown PADI Instructor.
Total crew on the Manthiri numbers 11 and they consistently went out of their
way to make sure all the needs of the guests were met. Whether it was getting
“The Knock” at 6AM to start the day, or making your bed, or providing fresh
towels, or loading your gear onto the dhoni (more on that in a bit), or handling
cameras, or reminding you of something you forgot, or helping you on or off with
your gear, and a myriad of other little pleasantries, as with my first visit, the crew
of Ibrahim, Bodey, Ahamdey, Nizam, Mohmed, Dhonbey, Razak, Saif, and
Ahsim, (in addition to Manik & Moosa) was absolutely top-notch. And because
many of them have grown up together or lived on neighboring islands, there’s a
cohesion and spirit to the crew that makes the trip that much more enjoyable.
When I visited in ‘96, the Manthiri (roughly 85’ long and 25’ wide) had just gone
through a major retrofit. It was nice to come back on board and see that the boat’s
been improved some even since then. The six cabins on the lower deck (two to a
room - now all with en suite facilities) are comfortable, clean, offer plenty of
storage, and have individual air conditioning units and an overhead fan. Each
cabin also has a small refrigerator/honor-bar. The main deck is mostly
inside/sheltered with a large salon that serves as a lounge (six comfy couches,
VCR, CD/stereo) and dining room (two large tables that each seat six) with a
smaller salon (one large couch and a lighted photo table) behind it. The upper
deck houses the bridge, a spacious sundeck, and a clothesline (with clothespins)
on which to hang wet stuff.
There are some other welcome changes/improvements as well.
Most appreciated by me (and anyone else who’s a photographer) is the addition in
the main salon of a very long waist-high photo table, which was the perfect place
to work on cameras. The table runs almost the complete width of the Manthiri
salon and there are cubbyholes below for small tool/film/battery storage as well as
plugs around suitable for charging. (I don’t use anything rechargeable so can’t
attest to the reliability of the electrical. But others seemed to have no problems.)
In addition to that, the boat now offers E-6 processing ($12/roll unmounted) for
those shooting slides. The aforementioned photo table makes it easy to see what
you’ve been doing and make sure everything’s working right on your camera.
And, unlike some other boats I’ve been on where they want to wait until there are
five or six rolls before they develop, Moosa’s happy to process even a single roll
for you.
The other significant change involved alcohol. Being a Muslim country, alcohol
simply isn’t part of the norm in the Maldives and when I was there in ‘96, no
alcohol was served on the boat. However, that’s not only changed, but it’s now
generally complimentary. Wine is now served as part of the dinner (which was
always done after the night dive) at no extra charge. If you don’t want wine, beer
is also available, but you’ll pay extra for that. They also charge extra for sodas but
provide bottled water (2-liter bottles) at no extra charge.
The other unique experience about diving in the Maldives (and this is not just
with the Manthiri) is the dhoni (pronounced DOAN-ee), which is basically a small
tender, about 40’ by 10’ which serves as your dive boat. All the gear is left on the
dhoni (cameras obviously got back and forth) but you basically use the Manthiri
as your mother ship and then when it’s time to dive, the dhoni comes alongside,
everyone climbs aboard, and off you go.
The dhoni’s equipped with two compressors, all the tanks (steel 95s and
aluminum 80s - all cleverly nestled in a central recessed rack), and dive stations
for each diver. The dhoni crew hooks up your gear before each dive and helps you
on with your tank. Each diver also has a large plastic laundry basket for fins,
masks, and other goodies. Four entry points (two forward, two aft - two port, two
starboard) make getting everyone in a breeze. There’s a new and much-improved
ladder to come reboard the dhoni when you’re done with the dive. And there’s a
long 1” PVC tube running the length of the dhoni (with clips) that’s perfect for
hanging your wetsuit or lycra after each dive.
One thing to understand about the Maldives is that if you’re a go-go-go diver like
I am, you’re not going to squeeze in five or more dives a day. The general plan
was for four dives each day, including the night dive, and on a few days we only
did three. Some of the reasons for this involve the logistics of moving from
site-to-site in an atoll, some of this is because of the depths encountered on each
dive, and some of this is from being rooted in a more European mindset of two
dives a day being plenty. Dives are escorted by Manik and Moosa, either as one
big group or sometimes two smaller groups.
We’d start each day around 6AM, congregate for coffee/tea/rolls in the salon, and
dive around 7AM. Breakfast was around 8:30, followed by the second dive
around 11AM. Lunch was served after that and many would get in a quick
afternoon nap. We dove again no later than 3PM, had low tea around 4:30, and
then usually did our night dive around 6PM (sundown’s generally at that time),
with dinner being served no later than 8PM. Most everyone was conked out by
10PM.
But the diving was - in a word - fabulous. The short version is that if you subtract
whale sharks and manta rays, we saw just about everything else over the course of
the 30 dives we made in 9½ days of diving. We traveled to five of the Maldivian
atolls (North & South Malé, Feldihe, Ari, and Rasdhoo). Water temperature was a
toasty 85º and the visibility averaged 100’ with the water generally a deep shade
of blue. There was one dive where Manik, Moosa, and I all came back with grins
on our faces and each of us asked, “So, what do you think the visibility was?” We
collectively agreed that it was 200’ and you got a stunning perspective of the reef
on that particular dive.
To dive the Maldives (by the way, it’s pronounced MALL-deeves, not
MALL-dives) you had better be comfortable in current. The currents ranged
anywhere from mild to I-can’t-believe-how-fast-I’m-flying. Generally, we drifted
with the current, but occasionally we had to go up-current or cross-current so
that’s something you need to be prepared to deal with. The currents also make
photography difficult at times. A Reef Hook will be put to good use..
If you go to the Maldives, you should also be comfortable with sharks. We didn’t
really see huge numbers at any given time (not like you’d find in Cocos,
Galapagos, or the Sea of Cortez) but we did see sharks on just about every dive
and at just about any point in the dive. Black-tips were very common, along with
white-tips, a few grays, an occasional Silver-tip, and we had a very nice treat
(twice) of encountering solitary hammerheads.
If you go to the Maldives, plan to seeing fish. LOTS of fish. More fish than
you’ve probably ever seen in one place at one time, and more species (over 1000)
than you’ve encountered before. In fact, it’s an excellent idea, prior to your trip, to
get a good fish ID book and go through it after each dive and check off the
animals you saw. (I highly recommend “Indo-Pacific Coral Reef Guide” by Allen
& Steene. The Manthiri also has a good collection of fish ID books on board.) But
be prepared to be overwhelmed and plan on making lot of mental notes to identify
species.
One impression I have, and really got on every dive, is that there have to be more
Red-toothed triggerfish in the Maldives than anywhere else in the world. There
were dives where you’d swear there were a million of these fish covering the reef.
Amazing. And they were almost matched in numbers by the anthias (of all
varieties) that also abound.
In addition those, we saw Blue trevallies, Golden trevally, Giant trevallies,
barracuda (both Chevron and Great), garden eels galore, dartfish (including an
Elegant), parrots, every imaginable butterfly and angelfish (including frequent
sightings of the stunning Yellow-mask angel), marble rays, black rays, wahoo,
Titan triggers (lots of them), pipefish, lizardfish, countless clownfish (including
the endemic Maldivian clown), scorpionfish, stonefish (some very brightly
colored - first time I’d ever seen that in a stonefish), Napoleon wrasses
(humpheaded males and the smaller females), Eagle rays, big schools of jacks,
gobies galore, sweetlips of all description, sweepers, puffers, some tuna (!!),
delightful damsels, Bigeye bream, armies of soldierfish, morays of all shapes and
sizes (including the impressive Honeycomb or Chain Mail moray), unicornfish,
snappers, batfish (but no robinfish), barberfish, a comet (look it up) . . . did I
mention the part about “more fish than you’ve ever seen in one place before?”
Among some of the amazing fish encounters we had were a very tame and calm
male Napoleon who not only approached you to be caressed, but who also allowed
(encouraged??) Moosa to kiss him on the lips! There was a school of barracuda
hovering over a cleaning station that allowed me to glide in and become part of
their group for a while. At Fish Head (Ari Atoll) there’s a ledge down around 100’
that must have had close to 10,000 yellowstripe snappers schooling under an
overhang, while sharks cruise the drop-off just in front, and Teira batfish cruise
between the two.
One of my favorite spots was in Felidhe Atoll. The official name for the site is
Boli Rock but I think the name ought to be changed to Laundromat because I saw
more cleaning going on here than any place that I’ve ever been diving before. The
little cleaner wrasses were having a field day going in and out of the gills and
mouths of every species of fish you can think of. Photographically it was great
because, since the fish are holding still while they get cleaned, if you can move in
without spooking them, you can get some great up-close-and-personal
opportunities. I ran through my whole roll of 36 in about 20 minutes (on a dive
that lasted almost 70 minutes). Thank goodness for mental images.
The fishy highlight was provided courtesy of Moosa who came up to me at Atha
Tila (Ari Atoll) with a huge grin and made me give him an underwater high-five
before he’d show me what he found. I remember thinking, “If you demand a
high-five, this had better be good.” It was. Moosa had found a jet black frogfish,
about the size of both my open hands put together, sitting in the branches of a
coral. It was really cool. Moosa told me later than he’d spotted the same animal a
few months earlier in the same area and assumes he’s a resident.
As good as the fish were, the coral wasn’t in quite as good shape, but it’s certainly
not a dead reef. If you’re looking for pretty Indo-Pacific coral, I think you’ll do
better in a place like Sulawesi, Indonesia, or Papua New Guinea. (But you
probably won’t get as many fish.)
The reefs in the Maldives are recovering from the 1998 bleaching but you
certainly still see evidence of the damage. I think that on just about every reef we
dove, we saw coral rubble and white coral, but also saw healthy coral as well. I
even checked my notes/report from my 1996 trip and don’t see any mention of
coral problems so this aspect of the experience definitely changed, and not for the
better. However, there’s a proliferation of soft corals, including an especially
lovely variety with a bright yellow stalk and red polyps. You’ll also find plenty of
fans, whip corals, anemones, as well as invertebrates of all kinds, so it’s not like
you’re diving in a desert. But I definitely noticed (and it’s certainly evident in the
pictures I took) that there’s a lot more white (aka dead) coral than you’d normally
expect to encounter.
I don’t think the following has anything to do with the deterioration of the reefs,
but there were a lot more dive boats now than in 1996. Back then, I think there
were maybe two. Now there are 20 or more. In 1996 we pretty much had the place
to ourselves. This time, there was almost always another dive boat somewhere
nearby, especially at the nighttime anchorages. Not a big deal, but obviously, more
divers probably equals more reef damage (although both Manik and Moosa were
very good about counseling to stay off the reef, and I’m sure other guides are the
same).
In addition to the underwater encounters, we made a couple of forays into local
villages. Some of these are tourist traps (some cruise ships stop by, too) as they
have more shops than most mini-malls but you can go in, look around, and learn
to say “No thanks” an awful lot. (Although I must admit that at one little shop on
a remote island I was able to find two of those cheesy plastic snowdomes - my
mother collects them - so it’s worth looking around.)
We also dubbed Kevin Brooks “The Candy Man” because he’d brought with him
a couple of hundred small candy bars and lollipops to give out to the kids in the
villages. The youthful mob scene around him everywhere he went (once the word
got out- which didn’t take long) made him look like the lead singer in a boy band
with his fans clamoring for autographs.
We ended our journey where it began, in Malé, but this time with a walking tour
of the city (about an hour long) that’s part of the overall Manthiri package (as is
an evening visit to a village where the local men dance and sing fishermen songs -
very energetic and unique). Malé is a bustling place with a population of
somewhere around 50,000 but it was interesting to walk around and see the prison
(the first place they take you), the first traffic light in Malé (only a few years old -
they had to have classes for people to understand how to react to them), the main
mosque, the presidential residence, and - my favorite - the fish market, where
everyone comes to buy their daily fish. It’s a type of cultural experience you
simply can’t find anywhere in the U.S.
All in all, we had a fantastic time. Despite the coral problems mentioned earlier,
the diving was still spectacular, the reef formations very dramatic, the food and
service aboard the Manthiri nothing short of excellent, and the overall experience
incredibly memorable. The Maldives is one of those places that takes a lot of
effort and money to get to, but is well worth the investment.
Will I go back? Absolutely, and I will use the Manthiri again. Would I
recommend you to go? Only if you want to savor a unique diving experience
that’ll create lifelong memories.