kashurst
Well-Known Member
As a way of avoiding the winter boating blues we recently went on an extremely boaty holiday. Always wanted to see Manta Rays etc so when a special offer to have a week on a Liveaboard boat in the Maldives came up at a bargain price we went for it. I no longer dive and MrsA never has, so this particular week was a snorkelling and diving trip. You get to live aboard a 90" motor yacht for a week with similarly like mind people but at the fraction of the cost of renting a 90' Sunseeker/Princess etc. All crewed, excellent food etc.
the boat is called Moonima, based in the Maldives out of Male. Locally made from wood (although it looks like F/B from a distance). Single volvo 360Hp engine on shaft, round bilge hull with keel. Cruising speed about 9Kns. Inside think Trader style fit out. Lovely wide side decks and outside seating areas. Inside, lots of wood, posh beds and bathrooms. Only criticism is the aircon is noisy (take ear plugs) Google it for more pics etc. Obviously its not built to the level of fit and finish of a Sunseeker etc but it floats/goes perfectly well. The boat does not have stabilisers.Most of the time no problems as the sea inside the lagoons is pretty flat, but once or twice on longer trips in the Indian Ocean proper it did get a bit rolly. It's a big boat though so roll period quite slow and only a few glasses got broken.
The boat does a circuit of the islands crossing from atoll to atoll with bits of the Indian Ocean in between. So cruising time about 8 hours a day, with dive/snorkelling trips 3 times a day, always at a different location. Doing a dive/snorkel is obviously not compulsory (I don't do early) however the dive leads know exactly where to go depending upon the time of the year, so you always know which ones are a real must do and which if you are tired give a miss. And it is pretty tiring - each trip is about 45 minutes in the water. The first trip usually being at 7-00am so up early. As a result there were no late boozy nights as people were tired by 9-30pm.
There is an oceanic current running through the Maldives all the time and it reverses direction twice a year. This is one of the reasons why they get large marine animals in the area most of the time. It also makes interesting drift dive/snorkelling trips as you have no choice but to go with the flow. There is a tidal current but the oceanic current dominates it most of the time.
Dive trips take place via the Dive Doni (dive boat) that accompanies the main boat everywhere and acts as a service tender for picking up people from airports etc. There is also a small fast tender with a 60Hp outboard - properly quick. The dive boat has all the dive kit, compressors etc aboard. So you just clamber down from Moonima onto the dive boat and shoot off close in to the reefs. The reefs often come out 1/2 a mile or more from the visible islands so often times we seemed to be jumping out into the middle of the ocean - however we were always within about 10 - 20m of the reefs. Divers jump out one side, snorkelers out the other.
After diving etc there was always excellent food served in the lower cockpit with the ocean view behind.
One particular lunch was especially memorable as a pod of dolphins followed the boat whilst we were eating surrounded by beautiful palm covered islands in deep blue water.
In the evenings there are no harbours really so the boats anchored every night in the shelter of an island. Because of the reefs, the boat often anchors a long way off. Anchoring seemed to be dropping the main ships anchor then taking a large grapel style anchor and a very long rope out on the tender about 200 yards and dropping that too. The idea being that at the time of year we were there, the wind always comes from the NE. So the grapel anchor and rope stopped the boat drifting around in a big circle. Sometimes other boats would arrive at the same anchorage.
It turns out there are about 200 similar boats cruising around the islands for 7 months of the year.
So did we find any Manta Rays?
yes lots in several places where the plankton is particularly rich (and makes the water hazy)
Later in the week we also found some whale sharks
and of course clown fish (Nemo!) etc
and a great many other marine sights and sounds, rays, sharks, turtles, barracudas etc etc.
Sadly we had to return back to the cold and snow of the UK. However the cafe outside Male airport while we waited for our flight, has to be the best boat spotting place ever. Just a constant stream of various MoBos arriving to collect guests for the hotels on all the many islands in the area. In this picture the boat on the left is a Gulf Craft, the right one is I think, a Sessa.
Saw about 6 Princess boat dotted about the islands as well. All the boats in great condition, and even the older models did not seem to emit any exhaust smoke etc. I think this is because of the almost constant use and probably newer engines. Diesel fuel in The Maldives is about 60 US$ cents a litre. Collision regs seem to work on the fastest boat gets right of way - some of the small local boats had 4 x 300Hp outboards on the back, absolutely flying about. Non of the boats seem to have radar - one day it poured with rain so hard you couldn't see more than about 50m, for about an hour and our boat and another near by just stopped until the rain went away and the sun came out again.
So I hope this post warms up a probably snowy day. Fantastic extremely boaty trip. Just seemed to spend the whole time switching from boat to boat, dashing about the ocean. We got to see how the other half live on the very big Mobos and got to see and do some amazing things. If anyone fancies doing something similar - just a note of caution, it's definitely not child friendly and you do need to be strong swimmers and experienced divers/snorkelers used to jumping into deep water sometimes with a current etc.
PS and don't book with Voyage Prive - bl@@dy useless.
PPS thanks for the tip on photo hosting websites Imgur very very easy to use - cheers.
the boat is called Moonima, based in the Maldives out of Male. Locally made from wood (although it looks like F/B from a distance). Single volvo 360Hp engine on shaft, round bilge hull with keel. Cruising speed about 9Kns. Inside think Trader style fit out. Lovely wide side decks and outside seating areas. Inside, lots of wood, posh beds and bathrooms. Only criticism is the aircon is noisy (take ear plugs) Google it for more pics etc. Obviously its not built to the level of fit and finish of a Sunseeker etc but it floats/goes perfectly well. The boat does not have stabilisers.Most of the time no problems as the sea inside the lagoons is pretty flat, but once or twice on longer trips in the Indian Ocean proper it did get a bit rolly. It's a big boat though so roll period quite slow and only a few glasses got broken.
The boat does a circuit of the islands crossing from atoll to atoll with bits of the Indian Ocean in between. So cruising time about 8 hours a day, with dive/snorkelling trips 3 times a day, always at a different location. Doing a dive/snorkel is obviously not compulsory (I don't do early) however the dive leads know exactly where to go depending upon the time of the year, so you always know which ones are a real must do and which if you are tired give a miss. And it is pretty tiring - each trip is about 45 minutes in the water. The first trip usually being at 7-00am so up early. As a result there were no late boozy nights as people were tired by 9-30pm.
There is an oceanic current running through the Maldives all the time and it reverses direction twice a year. This is one of the reasons why they get large marine animals in the area most of the time. It also makes interesting drift dive/snorkelling trips as you have no choice but to go with the flow. There is a tidal current but the oceanic current dominates it most of the time.
Dive trips take place via the Dive Doni (dive boat) that accompanies the main boat everywhere and acts as a service tender for picking up people from airports etc. There is also a small fast tender with a 60Hp outboard - properly quick. The dive boat has all the dive kit, compressors etc aboard. So you just clamber down from Moonima onto the dive boat and shoot off close in to the reefs. The reefs often come out 1/2 a mile or more from the visible islands so often times we seemed to be jumping out into the middle of the ocean - however we were always within about 10 - 20m of the reefs. Divers jump out one side, snorkelers out the other.
After diving etc there was always excellent food served in the lower cockpit with the ocean view behind.
One particular lunch was especially memorable as a pod of dolphins followed the boat whilst we were eating surrounded by beautiful palm covered islands in deep blue water.
In the evenings there are no harbours really so the boats anchored every night in the shelter of an island. Because of the reefs, the boat often anchors a long way off. Anchoring seemed to be dropping the main ships anchor then taking a large grapel style anchor and a very long rope out on the tender about 200 yards and dropping that too. The idea being that at the time of year we were there, the wind always comes from the NE. So the grapel anchor and rope stopped the boat drifting around in a big circle. Sometimes other boats would arrive at the same anchorage.
It turns out there are about 200 similar boats cruising around the islands for 7 months of the year.
So did we find any Manta Rays?
yes lots in several places where the plankton is particularly rich (and makes the water hazy)
Later in the week we also found some whale sharks
and of course clown fish (Nemo!) etc
and a great many other marine sights and sounds, rays, sharks, turtles, barracudas etc etc.
Sadly we had to return back to the cold and snow of the UK. However the cafe outside Male airport while we waited for our flight, has to be the best boat spotting place ever. Just a constant stream of various MoBos arriving to collect guests for the hotels on all the many islands in the area. In this picture the boat on the left is a Gulf Craft, the right one is I think, a Sessa.
Saw about 6 Princess boat dotted about the islands as well. All the boats in great condition, and even the older models did not seem to emit any exhaust smoke etc. I think this is because of the almost constant use and probably newer engines. Diesel fuel in The Maldives is about 60 US$ cents a litre. Collision regs seem to work on the fastest boat gets right of way - some of the small local boats had 4 x 300Hp outboards on the back, absolutely flying about. Non of the boats seem to have radar - one day it poured with rain so hard you couldn't see more than about 50m, for about an hour and our boat and another near by just stopped until the rain went away and the sun came out again.
So I hope this post warms up a probably snowy day. Fantastic extremely boaty trip. Just seemed to spend the whole time switching from boat to boat, dashing about the ocean. We got to see how the other half live on the very big Mobos and got to see and do some amazing things. If anyone fancies doing something similar - just a note of caution, it's definitely not child friendly and you do need to be strong swimmers and experienced divers/snorkelers used to jumping into deep water sometimes with a current etc.
PS and don't book with Voyage Prive - bl@@dy useless.
PPS thanks for the tip on photo hosting websites Imgur very very easy to use - cheers.
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Also you do use fins right?
