Maldives

Maldives
Wedding anniversary III

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She said ‘Ohh’.. As in “Ohhhh my Godddd” with her hand on her mouth when one of the Maldives island looked exactly like a skyblue necklace with lots of diamonds on the blue sea on our last day – when we took off. I was really thrilled too. Not for the beauty but by the expression.. It took more than 10 vacations at 8 different countries in the last 3 years to see such expression on her face.. hmmmm..

Life runs fast.. you would have seen this line in this site many times. Here goes another time.. 😛 Indeed it runs fast. Either am not running at the speed I want to run or the time really runs fast. 😉 Its been 3 years since we married. April 5th remind me many things. One of them is, its vacation time!!. Weather was not really too good to enjoy New Zealand in April. To make our dilemma of whether or not NZ, we got a solid reason which made her to be out of her job. That kinda persuaded us both to postpone NZ for another time.

There starts my atleast 2 less-sleep-nights. After a lot of introspective questions, my heart opened up to me and said, wanna go to India which is quite rare. Alright, India is fine as part of the vacation and whats the other part. A blink, a blink of google map to be precise, shows me Maldives and thats all. No looking back after that. So we decided to go to Maldives directly from SG, then India as the ‘other part’ before returning to SG.

Maldives

Maldives, one of the most complex entity by all means. Be it geographical, history, transportation and what not. Every thing is complex enough to raise lots of interest. Am not going to give you a Wiki entry here, but whatever interested me. First, Maldives comprises of 2000 islands and only 200 are habitated. All of them interestingly, hardly 3 meters higher than the sea level. How you like to feel you are in the mighty Indian ocean with 200 miles of water atleast on any direction and floating on non-active or dead coral islands. Thats fact. So how it managed to get those 2000 islands (literally 2000 volcanos ) that too at THAT place.

Well, little story comes here. Long long ago, so long ago (am talking almost when the earth settled down with water – that period), there was only one landscape. Yes, the One earth, one world, one island. Later, that got split into two. Making AsiaEuropa one and AfricaAmerica one (not toooo sure about this). Later India decided to part from Africa and moved towards asia and joined. This has formed Mount Himalayas. During the voyage of India in the Indian ocean, it left or touched the crests beneath the surface and made good contact with the molten lava and there goes some fireworks. Later India moved on but the volcanos remained there itself. Indian ocean cooled them off initially and killed them later over a period of 30 million years. During this 30 million year period, those volcanos have been tamed by corals and they formed beautiful crowns. Later, volcanos died and receded into water but these coral crowns are still shining on water.
What a story isnt it. All true!!!.

We started on 3rd April with the little transit at Kuala Lumpur. Flights were exactly on time. When we have long transits it happens. So we ended up walking lot, eating a lot, shopping a lot. We reached Male that night around 9PM. Male a 5 square KM capital island of Maldives. Rufiyaa is the currency and gives 13 for 1 USD. Interestingly Rufiyaa cant be converted to any other currency. So, USD is the active currency here. Well, that gets the tag “costly” to the country.

We decided to stay 5 days out there which is the least to their standards. They talk anywhere between 15 days to months as the standard vacation duration out there. And the cost for the resorts goes anywhere between 500-10000 USD per day. Yes, thats 10,000 USD per day. Hmmm.. at times I feel, nothing.. 😐 We wanted to encash what Male city offers and the nearby islands. So we stayed 3 nights in Holiday Inn at Male and the last 2 days at Bandos Island resort.

Holiday Inn is brand new. As we requested, we got high floors. Hotel claims as the tallest of Male with a pool at the roof. Hospitaly standards are good to Maldives standards. Still nowhere comparable to other asian cities. Its across Maldives nothing specific to Holiday Inn.

After lot of discussion with concierge, we decided to go on a snorkelling and diving trip. We tried whale submarine which ran full until we returned and to the worst, we couldnt even see a person at the counter anytime to address. Coral walker (under water walking – event, also not seen in the airport). Maldives is not at all internet friendly country. Choose a good resort, use the facilities what they offer, eat what they serve (more than enough for all our needs.. :P).

We had joined other two divers and we went on. Am still to finish my PADI certificate so I was not allowed for deep diving but a Discover Scuba Diving course. Hardly this is my third dive into the water. First two were at Bali which almost made to forget the idea of diving. But this one was all worthy. I got into the water and the instructor checked my abilities. Things never work for me when I have to show-off. My mask was leaking. Salty water got into my eyes, I was breathing properly but unable to clear my mask. Got to the surface and cleaned the mask again and went again. This time it was much better. Maldives is coral rich place and has ultra clear water. We can see almost 100 feet below the water clearly. Its true. Water is clearer than the swimming pool, everywhere.

Beneath water, its really beautiful. That too with oxygen, I felt am also a fish. I was expecting more vibrant colors of coral but mostly they were light-ash colored. We saw few Eeels, some weirdest creatures, and many coloured fishes. It was a good experience. In no time (in 45 mins), my cylinder started to warn me about the pressure level which means time to go to surface.

I was really worrying about Thenmozhi as Maldives has nothing but water sports especially diving and snorekeling. She dont even prefer to try snorekeling. Swimming is still a new language to her. However, I had put lot of good words about snorekeling before the trip. That worked. While I dived, she went on snorekeling with an instructor. I salute that guy. I bet he must be have had lots of patience.

After some rest and some snorekeling, I was ready for the next dive. This time, I carefully took a better mask which proved to be a worthy thing I did. This time, diving gave more pleasure. Still those some of the weird list creatures were making me to take more quicker breaths.

That concluded the activities for the day and we got back to the city. It was real good experience. It has super markets, shops, restaurants. But forget them, and forget Male. If you are a tourist you have no business here. 😉

5th April

We wished each other and thanked each other for making it really to work.. 😀 Plan for the day was to try our luck with Scenic photo flight tour. As a morning gift, Maldivian Air taxi operator (as if he owns 100 planes), told its-not-available for any day as they were fully booked. Indeed, its peak season. Still he could have used little politeness. Then we decided to go to Airport Island (hulhulmale) to check other options. Male to Airport is 10 Ruffia by Govt operated ferry which operates all 24 hours. Its a superb way of transportation between airport and Male. We went to airport and as a last try, we enquired Air Taxi station for any tours. Just earlier in the morning there was some rain (which is quite rare to them) that delayed many flights landing at Male. Thats inturn affected the scheduled Air taxis which were fully booked. On a typical day, a photo flight will cost 550 USD per person for 15 mins flight ride. But we were offered one-fifth of that cost for a 40 min scenic flight. Well, we assumed thats our gift for the day. We were picked up from Airport to Air taxi base and waited for our turn. These guys run scheduled departures to resorts for dropping the guests. We had been added to the group, but we get back too to Male on the same flight. After an hour of waiting and few good talk with crew out there, we got our flight. Its a twin otter engine which deafens you almost. It was awesome experience, we should say.

It was not a too bright day (thats not typical), still islands were looking gorgeous and beatutiful. Efforts put to build those lovely resorts were extraordinary. No wonder why they cost that much.. 😛 We neared Filitheyo resort and our plane landed beautifully on the water. It travelled to a 6×6 wooden platform in the sea which had no connectivity to island. We got down to explore (??!!) while the guests got down. All of a sudden a boat from the nearby island appeared and picked the guests. We took couple of pics and settled in the plane again. This time, pilots flew at a lower attitude and if offered feast to our eyes.

6th April

We checked out Holiday Inn and got picked up by Bandos Island resort people at the airport. A speedboat got us to the resort in 10 mins which is almost 7 Kms from the airport. This is one of the famous resort in Maldives with maximum capacity to serve guests. It has got 4 restaurants, 3 bars and hell of activities to participate. Beach Cottages are huge and really gives wonderful feeling about the resort. Bandos house reef is really famous for its richness. We settled ourself and spent rest of the day in eating and walking around the island.

7th April

We had used adventure sports team and they were happy to take us with their options. We settled with Water Skiing and Para sailing. We went to Kuda bandos which is a nearby island that offers all sort of water sports activities. Unlike other places, we got the bike to ourselves. Great. We started riding. Thats exactly responds to the same level of our adrenaline. Poor she, begged to drop her back on the beach after 10 mins (even after I offered the ride slowly). Alright, sometimes its better to listen. So left her at the beach and I continued. In no time, I felt like I have a 500 CC motorbike on a free highway just to me. Cant wait for another experience.. 😛 After that we did snorkeling at the inhouse reef which was way better than the Male one. Later that day, we tried Parasailing at the resort itself. It was really cool. Unlike running/walking during take-off, this offers just sitting flat and a cool take-off from the boat. View was really good from there.

Again its snorekeling time. Eventhough I can swim, dive, I settled with a life jacket along with her as she has the habit of drowning me in the name of getting balance. Cant really help these non-swimmers.. 😛 She held my hand all the way and enjoyed the alien world right beneath us. Am seriously so much on the ‘evolution’. So many things has happend with evolution. So much practices and so much of changes. But all were related to usage and applications. Few used hands, few didnt. Few wanted to use nose to carry and few avoided. So much to go on. But one evolution became beautified generation after generation which are coral fishes. God is really partial to all of us. How come he can make a world with just one thing in mind. ‘Just the beauty’. And I never knew these color fishes that we see in aquarium could be almost 4~5 feet out here. Little ones are not afraid of us but the bigger ones are. After enough wandering through the corals, we decided to reach the shore. On our way back, we saw a 5 feet Shark. We were fully aware that they breed baby sharks and its all over the resort. And this one also a-small-one (to its real size). Before I could catch that on a pic, that went on to the deeps.

We later called it a day and packed our stuffs for the departure on next day. Rest were almost eventless. Next day we reached Bangalore and another full episode of non-stop-fun with our gang started. Dont worry, we dont share that here.. 😀

Male City – the biggest of Maldives

Hulhumale – Airport island, almost manmade one

Their only hope to navigate

Maldives Air Taxi station

Name says it, isnt it..

@Scenic tour, one of 2000 beautiful islands

A stopover at a 6×6 feet wooden platform (Internation Airport – it claims) @Filitheyo resort

Ideal place, to dive-in

okay – time to test the experience

God is indeed partial.. their world is more beautiful than ours

after 45 mins, am done with first cylinder

With next cylinder, this scary bigg eeel. almost 6 feet long

meeeeeeeeeeeeee

A thorny fish, couldnt get a good picture.. 🙁

Snorkeling time @ Bandos island

Still wondering, whats that white fella did.

accepted..thats lousy pose..

Thats Thenmozhi.. Her turn..

This is me.. my turn.. 😛

Thats where we did snorkeling.. no clues the beauty beneath

Kuda Bandos Island

This is from Bandos island

My reputation continues.. “He always takes from rear”..hmmm

I wish I can paint this.. (and sell for million dollars).. 😛

Dusk, and matching wowww colors..

.. well..thats their best effort.. 😀

Sundowners bar, Bandos Island resort

What a rush.. Managed to scare her in the first 10 mins and then its all mines.. >:)

Saving the cap.. looked good timing to me..

5 more mins, I would have fainted under that hot sun.. 😛