We stayed at the island in the above picture for a nice long weekend last week. This year Poya (the full moon holiday), Sri Lankan New Year, and Easter all fell within a day of each other. So, we took the opportunity to visit fantasy island. There are actually several ways to reference where we were in the Maldives, we were at the Faadhippolhu Atoll in the administrative district of Lhaviyani, on Madhiriguaidhoo Island at the Palm Beach Resort. The whole island is run by an Italian resort company, so most of the tourists were from Italy, which also meant most of the food was Italian. There were also a few Brits, Germans, and Japanese, but we were the only American visitors to the island in a while. The history of Maldives is quite interesting, and apparently, the Maldives is one of three countries in the world with a 100% Muslim population.
We only spent four days (three nights) in fantasy island, but that is probably all we could afford. So far, the Maldives has been the most expensive place we have ever been, but it was worth every Rufiyaa. (Actually, the US dollar is the preferred currency in the Maldives, but they also accept the Euro and of course the Maldivian Rufiyaa.)
We fit a lot of fun into the time we were there. We flew on a sea plane, went fishing, snorkeling, diving, relaxed, and ate a lot of good food (Italian and Maldivian). Now that we are both becoming diving addicts we are looking into an under water case for our camera. The sea life was fantastic. Imagine being surrounded by the most beautiful aquarium you have ever seen and that will give you an idea of what we saw. There were a countless array of colorful fish of all different sizes and shapes, but the highlights of the dive were the sightings of:
We only spent four days (three nights) in fantasy island, but that is probably all we could afford. So far, the Maldives has been the most expensive place we have ever been, but it was worth every Rufiyaa. (Actually, the US dollar is the preferred currency in the Maldives, but they also accept the Euro and of course the Maldivian Rufiyaa.)
We fit a lot of fun into the time we were there. We flew on a sea plane, went fishing, snorkeling, diving, relaxed, and ate a lot of good food (Italian and Maldivian). Now that we are both becoming diving addicts we are looking into an under water case for our camera. The sea life was fantastic. Imagine being surrounded by the most beautiful aquarium you have ever seen and that will give you an idea of what we saw. There were a countless array of colorful fish of all different sizes and shapes, but the highlights of the dive were the sightings of:
a moray eel,
a giant clam,
and a Napoleon Wrasse.
We also saw a reef octopus (but I couldn't find a picture of one). All the under water pictures were found online, but we soon hope to take pictures of our own. We were able to capture other footage of the trip and put the pictures into a vlog. There are still more videos coming from E & L's Excellent Adventure series, but we were so excited about our Maldives trip that we took advantage of the momentum to create the Maldives video. It is entitled "Maldives - take 2" because edits were made from the original posting in attempts to make the video file smaller. It is still about 22MB, but it is smaller than it was before. (We are still learning how to most effectively incorporate media files into our blogs and vlogs.)
If you have the time to download and watch the video - we hope you enjoy it.
By the way, we are happy to report that Nemo was found and reunited with his family.
Disclaimer:The video has captions referencing the Lunar New Year, which is incorrect. It should read,
'Sri Lankan New Year." There was a misunderstanding during the making of the video.
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