Sightseeing in Malé

At the end of my volunteering with the Maldivian Whale Shark Research Programme (MWSRP) I was for one day a normal tourist.

To avoid stress during my travel back to Germany, I booked one night in a hotel in Male, the capital of the Maldives. Actually, I was hoping for a late conection flight from Mamagili to Malé, but in the end I was already at 10 o’clock in Malé. And so I decided to use the time for a little sightseeing tour.

After 4 weeks on a small island with only 2 cars the traffic Situation at Malé was a shock for me. Apart from the fact that my feet were not longer used to closed shoes and socks.
With approximately 47,000 inhabitants per square kilometer Malé is the most densely populated city in the world . One can imagine that you can find a crowd of people , cars and motorbikes here.

My hotel was not far away from the public beach area of the town. Because of the high waves the Swimming area is behind some wave breakers. It is not possible to swim directly in the ocean. But it is a good place for kids to learn Swimming and also for adults to relax on the beach.

Around the beach area you can find some nice Restaurants.

After a good lunch I walked along the ocean to Jumhooree Maidhaan (Republic Square). It is a little park, marked by a flagpole with a giant Maldivian flag. in front of the police headquarter.

President-Jetty

Republic Square

 

 

 

 

 

Not far away from this place I found the market halls. That’s a place where it is not possible to avoid tourist groups. But normally they don’t have the time to go deep inside the market halls. And because of this you have the chance to enjoy the look and smell of unknown spices, vegetables and fruits without any disturbance.

Betel nut slices

Fruit of the Screw Pine

 

 

 

 

 

Next to the market halls I found the fish market. This is where are brought, gutted and sold for local consumption. It was a little bit irritating to see some fishes dead on the ground which I have seen some days before alive in the water.

 

 

 

 

Next I walked through busy side streets to the Friday Mosque and the Sultan Park .  In the side streets there are many small shops with everything you could need for daily life . If you need tupperware, that’s the right place.

Islamic Centre

Cemetery in front of Friday Mosque

Memorial to the vicims of a terror attack

And here a gallery with some more photos of my visit at Malé:

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New Year’s Eve on Dhigurah

New Year’s Eve on a local Island in the Maldives is a little different than in Germany. For the maldivian people it is a day like any other, but not for the guests of the guesthouses. And so the guesthouses had done some special Arrangements.

Our guesthouse has planned a special gala dinner on the beach. The same was done by the guesthouse next to us. But we skipped the gala dinners and went to a dinner at the only cafe on the island. It was also a good time to do some Shopping, because mostly all shops were open.

Then we went to the beach to see what’s happening there. The decoration of our guesthouse TME Retreat was very romantic.

The other guesthouse had built up the 2016th lights inside the water. Indeed, the wiring looked not really save. I decided to leave my feet outside the water 🙂

To short the time until midnight they organized a hermit crab race. They draw a big circle in the sand and put the crabs in the center of the circle. Every guest got a crab with a number on his shell assigned. The first crab who left the circle was the winner. I think some of the crabs  were doped. The first three left the circle after 30 seconds and others where after 5 minutes stil inside the circle. 

I thought fireworks are not allowed at the Maldives, but that was wrong. There are some Ressort Islands around Dhigurah. The first firework starts at 11 pm. I think that was a ressort with his own timezone. Maybe they do this because the guest want to sea the sunset during dinner 🙂

At midnight we saw two fireworks. One one the left side and one on the right side. I felt like watching a tennis match.
At least the fireworks were also watched by some local people.

After the beach was dark again, everyone goes to the loppy to use the free WiFi to send mails, WhatsApp- or Facebook message to friends and family around the world.

 

31.12.2015 – A crazy day

31.12.2015 – The last day of 2015 and also the last day on dhoni searching for whale sharks.

The day started normal with a blue sky, a little bit wind and a light rough sea.
We decided to leave later, because the other volunteers want to do their last dive at the Maldives. During the time I waited for them, the blue sky disappeard and it starts to rain.
But only a short time. After a few minutes, the sun was back.

When we reached the MPA (Marine Protected Area) there was no sign of any whale shark. Instead of them we saw a big black wall of clouds following us. We decided to leave the top of the dhoni and to put away all staff which should not get wet (clothers, papers, equipment,..). And then started a really strong tropical rain shower . That was the first time that I have shivered at the Maldives .

After thirty minutes the rain was gone and the sun was back.

And then the whale shark show started.

We found the whale shark Koko, because of a group of boats which stayed together. But it was only a short Encounter.

Then we found Lucky. He is easy to identify because of his injuries. We had 20 minutes together with him without any other people. After a speedboat

Dann kam Lucky. Er ist ganz einfach anhand von einer Verletzung erkennbar. Ihn konnten wir 20 Minuten lang alleine genießen. It was over after a speedboat with a group of snorkelers arrived at out place.

Whale Shark 170 – Lucky

The sea was still rough. Nevertheless succeeded Pippa , one of the volunteers, to discover another whale shark . Again it was Koko.

Whale Shark 183 – Kokko

Whale Shark 183 – Kokko

 

 

 

 

 

 

And when we started to enter the data about Kokko we heard our captain shouting “DucDucDucDucDuc” (I don’t know how to write this, but it means whale shark).
This encounter was really nice. We were the only people in the water with the shark and he swam next to the surface. You only had to take care of your position to the shark. He swam in circles.
It was a whale shark without any injuries and his body condition was very good.
Und das war ein wunderschöner Encounter. Wir waren völlig alleine mit dem Walhai und er schwam schön an der Oberfläche. Allerdings musste man aufpassen, dass man nicht auf einmal vor seinem Maul war. Er schwamm relativ flott im Kreis. Es war endlich mal ein Walhai ohne Verletzungen und in einem sehr guten körperlichen Zustand. One could also call him fat.
It was a new whale shark.

Unknown Whale Shark

Unknown Whale Shark

But that was not all. It was also a day of scratches. First, I slipped on the wet boat and hurt my right knee and one of my toes. Then Pippa don’t want to scare the last whale shark and tried to slide very slowly into the water. Unfortunately, she slipped also and got some scratches from the boat. But the injouries where not very bad.

Now we have to plan the new years eve. It looks like it is not a special event for the locals.

 

 

 

 

Maldivian underwater world

Beside the big fishes, rays and whales, you can also find a lot of small colourful fishes and more or less beautiful coral reefs.

Soldatenfisch – Squirrelfish

Dornenkrone

Balusstreifen-Doktorfisch

Clark’s Anemonenfisch

Dusky Gregory

Hawksbill turtle

Lined Surgeonfish

Orientalische Süsslippe

Longnose Butterflyfish

Glowspot Emperor

Double saddle Butterflyfish

Honeycomb Grouper

Monocle Bream

Sling-jaw wrasse

Yellow boxfish

Blotched porcupinefish

Clark’s Anemonenfisch

White-throated Surgeonfish

Blunt-snout Gregory

Pinstripped Butterflyfish

Peacock Grouper

Orange-spine Unicornfish

Parrotfish

Sea Cucumber

Sea Cucumber

Junker Wall Wrasse

Peacock Grouper

Needlefish

Dusky Gregory

Pipefish

Bluestripe Snapper

Humbug Damsel

Pinstriped Butterflyfish

Hawksbill Turtle

Parrotfish

Racoon Butterflyfish

Parrotfish

Gregory

Fine-lined Bristletooth

Parrotfish

Parrotfish

Glowspot Emperor

Bennetts Pufferfish

Bennetts Pufferfish

Unicorn-Fish

Peacock Grouper

Moorish-Idol

Grüner Schwalbenschwanz

 

 

Christmas on a local island of the Maldives

Actually, I had not expected anything special on christmas on a local island. But we got a surprise.

When we arrived the day before Christmas at the Lobby of the guesthouse, we saw the people working on something that looks like a tree. The basic was a triangle of Palm branches. On this they but a lot of some green staff, which looks like sea grass. After a while we saw a perfect christmal tree.

And at the room we found an invitation to the Christmas-Gala-Dinner.

On christmas eve the outside are was decorated very nice and there a big buffet in the garden.

But the Christmas tree was gone. Maybe it was an order from the goverment, that there are now christmal trees allowed on local islands.

But it was a very nice evening.

And on our beds we found a nice decorated present. It was a half coconut with cookies inside.

 

10 whale sharks on 2 days

The last two days we had a lot of luck. On Wednesday we had 6 encounters and on Thursday 4.  Altogether there were 8 different whale sharks. And for a short time we had 2 whale sharks together.

The first whale shark on Wednesday was Adam. Adam is a big whale shark. But he also had a injury. His dorsal fin is bended. And there were a lot of snorkelers and divers around him. The encounter was very chaotic.

Adam

The next one was Skye. This encounter was not so crowded.

The name of number 3 is unknown. We can’t find him in the database. Maybe it is a new one.

At the moment I want to eat something, number 4 was seen next to the dhoni. He is also unknown. There was a Remora hanging on his right side. The remora was very big. Maybe he came next to the dhoni, because he wants to try to remove the remora.

Ein Ramora

A few minutes later, we jumped again into the water. A whale shark was swimming around a boat. He dived down and came up again. Suddenly came up behind me a second whale shark . The first one disappeared very quickly. One of the two whale sharks was Choco . The reason  that they were next to the boat was a plankton cloud that hung just below it. I also had the impression that the whale sharks were very interested on the bubbles of the divers.  

Unbekannt

This time we had more than one hour with the whale sharks.

That was a very exciting day and on Thursday it went on.

On Thursday we planned to finish the research early, because we want to go for a night snorkeling. But that did not work.

We started the day with a nice snorkeling to cool the bodies a little bit.  A short time later we found the whale shark Dhombe, followed by Naococco. Naococco we had already seen some days before. It is a small whale shark (around 4 meters) with a lot of propeller cuts on his right side.

Naococco

At the Moment we wanted to go back to the harbour, we saw Adam. It was a longer encounter. And when Pischke arrived, we skipped the snorkeling.

Instead of snorkeling we used the evening for the identification of the sharks of the day. Also we tried again to find the unknown sharks from the day before. B still we can’t  find them.

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The daily schedule of a volunteer

Here comes the schedule of a normal research day:

• 7:30 Wake up
• 8:00 Breakfast
• 10 minutes walk to the Harbour
• Preparation of the clipboards with the forms for the entry of megafauna (normal whales, sharks, dolphins, turtles, rays, Mantas,..), vessels and whale sharks.
• Preparation of the equipment (GPS, cameras,..)
• 9:00 Leaving the harbour with the dhoni
  Now it is the time for sun creme. And the ladies can put away shorts and t-shirts. Outside the harbour they can wear a Bikini.
  
• Go to the top of the dhoni to look for whale sharks
• When we found a whale shark:
  • Write down the Position of the whale shark
  • Count of the vessels and the People in the water
  • Grap the camera and slide into the water
  • Making of id shots
  • Check the sex of the whale shark. Therefore you must dive under the whale shark
  • One Person has to film the shark the whole time from the back of the shark. This was done to document the behaviour of the shark.
  • More or less relaxed swimming with the whale shark
  • When the whale sharks disappeared, go back to the dhoni and put the following data into the forms
    • Maximum number of vessels and persons during the encounter
    • Distance from the vessels to the whale shark
    • Direction and strength of the wind
    • Direction and strength of the current
    • Visibility in the water
    • Temperature of the water
    • General weather data
    • Behavior of the whale shark
    • estimated size of the whale shark
    • Injuries
    • Behavior of the people
    • usw.
• Continue with the search. If there are no whale sharks or manta rays it is time for snorkeling or dragging.
• During the time at the marine protected area, we also write down the coordinates and names of the vessels we saw. Also the number of people at the vessels and wrong behavior of the vessels (speeding).
• Around 16:00 back to the harbour
• Time for a shower, relaxing or a visit at the Cafe.
• Around 18:00 start of the data entry and the identification of the whale sharks
• 19:30 Dinner
• Continue with the data entry or time for private
• Around 22:00 Sleeping

Friday and Saturday are free days. On this day you can go diving, snorkeling, laying on the beach or doing something else.

A few impressions of Dhigurah

The Maldive Whale Shark Research Programme (MWSRP) is placed on Dhigurah. That’s  a local island at the South-Ari-Atoll.

The volunteers had their accomodation at TME Retreats. That’s a guesthouse next to the beach. The rooms where  very nice and clean.

Dhigurah means long island. The island is around 3 km in length and it has a population of about 600. There are two schools, a harbour, a mosque, a health centre, some shops where you get the normal things of life, a cafe, places to play football, voleyball, kricket.., diving centers and a main street with around 10 souvenir shops.

And a lot of motor bikes, which are used specialy  in the evening very much.

There are only 3 cars. One from TME, on used for the transportation of material and one used as an ambulance.

2/3 of the island is used for fruit and vegetable gardening and natural vegetation.

The streets are make out of sand. Instead of benches you can find a lot of maldivian style deck chairs to sit down for a rest.

Dhigurah is connected by a sandbank with a 5*-Resort, but it is not allowed to visit the Ressort by using the sandbank.

The people of Dhugarah are friendly. Many of them work at the nearby resort while others are involved in fishing, agriculture and also in building new guesthouses.

Süd-Ari-Atoll

TME-Geusthouse

TME-Guesthouse

TME-Restaurant

TME-Restaurant

Cafe

Cafe

Schule

Einkaufsmeile von Dhigurah

Einkaufsmeile von Dhigurah

Hafen

Typisches Haus

Typischer Vorgarten

Typischer Vorgarten

Liegestühle, Parkbank

Mauer aus Korallen

Schreinerei

Palmziegel

Wichtiges Baumaterial: Korallensand

Baustelle

Typisches Fahrrad

Rizinusbäume

Rizinus

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The whale sharks are back again

After two days without whale sharks, they are back.

The day starts with an unsuccessful sighting. We saw a lot of boats and snorkelers in the water from the distance, but when we arrived at the place with our dhoni, the whale shark was gone.

But an hour later, we were successful. We started with drag snorkeling (the snorkeler was pulled on a robe behind the boat) when we saw a whale shark. It was Naococco. Naococco is a ca. 4 m long male whale shark. He has some major injuries from a propeller on his right side. Because of this injuries, he is very skinny.
A lot of whale sharks have injuries from propellers. There exists a speed limit at the MPA (Marine Protection Area), but a lot of boats drive faster when they try to bring the guests to a whale shark encounter.

Naococco

Naococco

And here comes a video of Naococco:

Most of the injuries of whale sharks where caused by the propellers of boats. Other injuries came also from fishing nets or from bytes of orcas. Beside humans the orca is the only real enemy of the whale sharks.

The next whale shark we saw was Jonah. He is around 6 meter long and was first seen in 2010.

Jonah

Jonah

And here also a video of Jonah:

And at the end of the day we tried again drag snorkeling. During the time I tried to make a photo of a turtle, the others saw a whale shark in the deep.
Our rescue-diver Muh dived into the deep and got an id-shot of the shark. He also dived deep enought to see the sex of the whale shark.
But afterwards he had some problems. It is not good to freedive to deep.

We identified the shark as Adam.

That was a very successful day.

Whale Shark Compensation

Fortunately, the open sea is no aquarium and therefore there is no guarantee that you will see whale sharks every day.
But on days without whale sharks there is usually a compensation. That happens also the last 2 days.

Yesterday we were not far away from the port of Dhigurah when we spotted three Manta rays. And one of the mantas was playing with the current next to the surface. That was good for me. I got the possibility to make a video of him or her.

The next day without whale sharks we also got an compensation. On our way to the dhoni we were stopped by a man with a motor bike. He told our rescue diver Muh, that someone has seen killer whales next to the harbour of Dhigurah.  We started running, jumped aboard the dhone and left the harbour immediately.

A few minutes later, we have seen in the distance a water fountain. When we arrived at the place, we have seen a blue whale, not a killer whale.
We tried to follow him, but he was to fast. After a while, we returned to the reef. However, not for long. We saw again a whale in the distance and immediately went back to the open sea.
This time parts of the whale were out of the water and he showed us his tail.

 

I created a little video on YouTube with the whale: