Maldives Complete Blog : geography

Best of the Maldives: No Shoes Commute – LUX* Maldives

Maldives Complete — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 08:27:57 GMT

At LUX* Maldives, the streets are paved with silky sand. Not just the pathways, but the major intra-island thoroughfares…across the ocean.

During low tide, one of the longest sandbanks in the Maldives connects LUX* to the neighbouring local island of Dhigurah (the sandbank is in the middle of the bottom of the picture above and Dhigurah would be further down below the edge of the picture). Guests actually need to avoid temptation of crossing it (there is a sign asking guest not to pass) because the local island is Muslim and things like women in bikinis are preferred kept in the resorts. Also, if guest loses track of the tide, then they can be stranded. But, a number of workers are from the island and walk across the isthmus land bridge to work at times.

Best commuter line ever.

Lightest Place on Earth

Maldives Complete — Sun, 07 Oct 2012 15:40:17 GMT

Here is a post with a little less gravity. Literally. (thanks Adrian).

All Maldives aficionados know that there is something special about the Maldives. Something unique about its landscape and topology that is simply not found anywhere else on the planet. It turns out that such distinction might extend beyond the expansive lagoons and mottled turquoise reef waters.

The European Space Agency (ESA) recently published findings from its pioneering GOCE (Gravity-Field Ocean Circulation Explorer) satellite measuring the gravitational field of the Earth. As the map above shows, the epicentre of the lowest gravity point on the planet is focused right over the Maldives.

My wife Lori and I joke how after a hard day’s work it seems as if someone must have turned up the gravity-thermostat in our house, because getting up off the couch seems to be as hard as jumping on Jupiter (and looking at the map, it seems that we weren’t too far off with our paranoia since in the UK since a large orange blog of extra strong gravity is looming right next door in the North Atlantic…my hypothesis is that this blob of extra gravity shifts on top of our house every Monday morning().

If you are thinking that this gravitational void is going to get you off the hook from multiple trips to the buffet, be aware that these variations in the gravitational field are quite minute and take sophisticated scientific equipment to detect (a sophistication that your bathroom scale is not likely to have).

But if you want to feel light on your feet, or have that ‘floating’ feeling (even on land), the Maldives is scientifically proven to be the lightest place on the planet.

Best of the Maldives: Produce Garden – Adaaran Hudhuranfushi

Maldives Complete — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 22:18:29 GMT

Happy Vernal Equinox!

The official arrival of spring is a milestone to start working on that garden. And if you are into gardening, then the resort with the ‘biggest’ appeal would be Adaaran Hudhuranfushi.

Hudhuranfushi has the largest produce garden of any resort in the Maldives. So you are guaranteed a massive selection of fresh produce at the buffet. Such diverse produce as squash-like ‘snake goat’ (see picture below). Gardening is big thing in terms of scale and heritage at Hudhuranfushi. Before it was a resort island, it was an agricultural island.

Guests are welcome to tour the massive complex, but a guide is recommended to highlight all the distinctive things growing there (and to help keep from getting lost).

Technorati Tags: Adaaran Hudhuranfushi,garden,Maldives

Best of the Maldives: Ornamental Garden – Adaaran Vadoo

Maldives Complete — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 02:18:00 GMT

Everyone talks about the Maldive seascape, but despite lacking in size, the Maldive landscapes are often just as striking in their colour and beauty. Most resorts work hard to bring out the very best with primping and fussing over bougainvillea, hibiscus, and oleander lining the pathways and accents around the island. But the winner of the blue ribbon for gardening has to go to Adaaran Vadoo.

Vadoo’s garden is one of the first things to hit you on arrival. Leaving the jetty, you emerge through a gate into a manicured horticultural masterpiece like stepping into some sequestered Eden. Passing through reception to the rest of the island brings you to an even more expansive park with flowers, topiary, paths, little sitting areas, ‘turtle sanctuary’, etc. Not only are the gardens exquisite, but they are also the dominant feature of the island itself. Being one of the smallest islands in the Maldives line-up, there is no room for even any villas (so they have 100% water villas). What little space exists is devoted more to blooms and blossoms than any other island.

Technorati Tags: Adaaran Vadoo,Maldives,best of,geography,garden

Best of the Maldives: Closest House Reef – Vilamendhoo

Maldives Complete — Sat, 08 May 2010 09:44:05 GMT

(Vilamendhoo Reef photo by Atoll Photography)

I have written on the ‘best’ house reef and the ‘deepest drop off’ house reef’, but one of the most prominent questions about house reefs is which is the ‘closest’. Given the Maldives atoll topology, often the land bit of the island can be surrounded by a quite considerable about of lagoon, which is very shallow waters, before the island structure itself drops off more precipitously into the deeper surrounding ocean. It is this drop off which is most dramatic as lots of marine life cluster and settle on this vertical structure and the larger expanse of water makes room for bigger fish and bigger schools of fish.

The problem can be that when you have a far away house reef, one can spend a good 15 minutes of boring swimming/snorkelling over an expanse of white sand shallow lagoon before reaching the house reef main event. The real snorkelling luxury is the close by drop off. In forums and reviews, people often talk about ‘close house reef’. That refers to the fact that the ‘drop off’ hits pretty close to the beach.

I asked the experts, the Forum contributors to TripAdvisor’s Maldives Forum, which resort had the closest. It’s a bit tricky because the reef can be very close at some parts of the island and then very far away in others. I had enjoyed Filitheyo’s close house reef about 50 meters away, but Forum folks came back with 20m, 10m, 5m and ultimately 3m from the beach. In fact, several resorts were noted that came within ‘3 metres’ of shore...

I have chosen Vilamendhoo because based on looking at all the resorts, Vilamendhoo appears to have the longest stretch of shore where the drop off is that close.

Best of the Maldives: House Reef – Kandoludhoo

Maldives Complete — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 08:26:33 GMT

One of the very first and most common questions to ask of any ‘Maldives Best Of’ selection is what is the ‘Best House Reef’.

Maldives is easily one of the world’s top dive areas up there with the Red Sea, the Great Barrier Reef, the Caribbean. But it really stands out for snorkelling. It’s topology of eroded atolls (check out Atoll Terms and Atoll Formation) provide endless shallow and protected areas for leisurely snorkelling as well as steeper reef walls for a different perspective.

The subject was raised on the premier travel review site, TripAdvisor – “Which are the Top 10 Best Resort Reefs?” – and the expert opinion for the top one is Kandoludhoo. The assessment comes from one of TripAdvisor’s top Maldive forum experts, ‘spammie’ with 1,946 posts on the Maldives to his credit. He writes...

“Kandoludhoo has been not been harmed in the '98 el nino due to lucky currents. So while the other reefs have had to recover from severe coral bleaching, Kandoludhoo looks just like the Maldives used to. To my knowledge its the only actually intact reef in the Maldives. It’s generally considered the number 1 reef because of that. It’s full of huge table corals and just impressive. Also easily accessible. However, several of the other reefs are recovering nicely and are quickly catching up again.”

Best of the Maldives: Dive Book – Tim Godfrey’s ‘Dive Maldives’

Maldives Complete — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 18:29:50 GMT

Amazon has over 50 books on the Maldives in its catalogue, but the very best is Tim Godfrey’s ‘Dive Maldives’. Comprehensive, clear with very useful dive maps and charts (examples of which are featured in MaldivesComplete’s ‘Profile’ area) along with good summaries of climate, geography and history.

Atoll Terms

Maldives Complete — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 09:51:00 GMT

Tim Godfrey’s ‘Dive Maldives’ is really the definitive work on these islands. It is focused on diving, but also has excellent general history, geography and background. The islands may look like plots of sand with a few palm trees, but they actually have a fair amount of diversity. In the picture above from his book, Godfrey outlines some of the key parts of a Maldive atoll island along with its Dhivehi name which are words you will come across often especially in the names of different places (ie. thila, giri, fary, finolhu, fushi).