Rossputin.com: Rational Thinking About Our World

Hello all,

In the interest of getting an interesting posting up while not having to stare at a screen much more than I already have in the past days, this week's travel posting is mostly pictures.

These are pictures which I took underwater in the Maldives Islands in December, 2003 while on my honeymoon.

The Maldives is a mostly-Muslim country (at least on the main island), southwest of the southern tip of India, in the Indian Ocean. Here's a map.

According to the CIA Factbook entry on the Maldives, the country is made up of 1,190 coral islands grouped into 26 atolls (200 inhabited islands, plus 80 islands with tourist resorts)

The islands are beautiful, with perfect white sand beaches. Each resort is on its own island which would otherwise be uninhabited.

The Maldives are rarely visited by Americans because it's such a pain to get to, having to fly to Europe first (if you're not coming from India or points east), and then another long flight to the capital of Male before a final flight on your air taxi (a sea plane.)

The resorts range from nice to insanely luxurious. We stayed first at a great little resort called Komandoo. We had our own little private villa a few steps off the water.

Looking at the room:

And looking from the room:

From there we went to One and Only Kanuhura, which is much more expensive and luxurious (not that Komandoo was anything to complain about.) Our room at Kanuhura was a "water villa" on stilts over the water. From the outdoor shower, you can look down through a cutout in the floor at fish swimming below, and the back deck has stairs right down into the ocean. Kanuhura has incredible service, including rooms with their own butlers and guys who come by to clear your sunglasses while you're lying by the pool.

Here's Kristen with some water villas in the background. Ours was the next to last one.

And here's Kristen enjoying the bathtub-warm water on the other side of the Island as a sea plane leaves Kanuhura:

The huge benefit of Komandoo is the amazing scuba very near the island and the great snorkling right around it.

In fact, one of the best underwater experiences I've ever had was snorkling with a manta ray just 100 feet off the beach at Komandoo. Mantas are huge...this one was pretty small and was still every bit of 5 feet across. They're deceptively fast, and they're filter feeders with no teeth. Absolutely gentle creatures as far as we're concerned. Spectacular.

Another beautiful sight wile snorkling was a Scrawled Filefish:

We did a lot of scuba diving, and the rest of the pictures are from these daily excursions. Kristen will certainly be spoiled, having done her PADI certification in one of the world's premier diving locations.

OK, now for a bunch of underwater pictures. I hope you enjoy them. The labels are below the images.

Giant Clam
(actually, this picture is from Australia)

Banner Fish

Sea Turtle

OK, it's not completely underwater...
Probably sunk intentionally for insurance money

Clown Triggerfish

Moorish Idol

Dog-faced Puffer

Napoleon Wrasse (nearly 4 feet long)

Speckled Moray (Eels really are quite nice)

Emperor Angel (adult)

Niger Triggerfish

Well, that's it for this week. I hope you've enjoyed the visit to one of my favorite vacation places (the Maldives) and my favorite hobby (scuba).