# Maldives



## NeilW (11 Jun 2013)

Hey guys

Just got back from honeymoon, thought I would show you guys a selection of my fish based photos I got whilst I was out there. It was incredible, the water was like a bath but with reef fish just sat waiting to be seen metres from the beach! Crazy.

Excuse the quality, I just bought a cheap housing for my compact camera to capture the moment.

I have real bad holiday blues now 













































I made a list of the species I IDed;

Blacktip Reef Shark
Feathertail Stingray
Silverside
Small-spotted Dart
Longtail Silverbiddy 
Broad-stripe Fusilier
Blackspot Emperor
Neon Damselfish
Humbug Dascyllus
Twospot Damsel
Sixspot Sleeper Goby
Elongate Surgeonfish
Barred Filefish
Picasso Triggerfish
Clown Triggerfish
Orange-striped Triggerfish
Yellow Boxfish
Grey-Streak Lizardfish
Spotted Unicorn
Black Gregory
Flutemouth
Black-spotted Pufferfish
Blue green chromis 
Royal Blue Tang
Powder Blue Tang
Reef Bannerfish 
Black-spot Sergeant
Checkerboard Wrasse
Parrotfish? unknown
Goldring Bistlenose Surgeonfish (juvenile)
Common Porcupinefish
Oriental Sweetlips (juvenile)
Moon Wrase
Spot-tail Sandperch
Orange-striped Triggerfish
Cuttlefish
Threadfin Butterflyfish


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## Ian Holdich (11 Jun 2013)

Congrats Neil! 

Looks awesome mate, the Maldives is on my to do list...


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## Gary Nelson (11 Jun 2013)

Thanks for putting those up... Great photos and really nice to see.... It looks fantastic!  congratulations to you too


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## Ady34 (11 Jun 2013)

Many congratulations Neil.

We also went to the Maldives for our honeymoon, Kuredu island, was an amazing experience. Which island did you go to?
Your photos are amazing, i particularly like the crab shot  My underwater shots turned out pretty poor (disposable underwater camera/poor photographer ), what amazed me was the baby sharks patrolling literally a few inches from shore, these were probably no bigger than 12"-14":









there was an air-taxi jetty with a coffee house on the end where rays came to feed, wish i had some photos of that. Did you see any turtles?
Boy it was a beautiful place and the food was amazing, id highly recommend it for anyone, total tranquility, sorry for spamming your thread but it made me revisit some of our photos and got me all excited again. Heres me a on what seemed like a never ending spit, a 'little' thinner and younger but i bet the island hasnt changed a bit:





and looking back at the island from the same spot on the spit  (easy for me to say):








NeilW said:


> I have real bad holiday blues now


i have them again now, and it was 7 years ago when i was there 

Hope you had a really great time, and congrats again 
cheerio,
Ady.


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## sciencefiction (12 Jun 2013)

These types of threads should be banned lol 
Wow  Lovely place and lovely pictures.


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## NeilW (12 Jun 2013)

Cheers chaps, it truly felt unreal. I feel very lucky to have gone.



Ady34 said:


> We also went to the Maldives for our honeymoon, Kuredu island, was an amazing experience. Which island did you go to?
> Your photos are amazing, i particularly like the crab shot  My underwater shots turned out pretty poor (disposable underwater camera/poor photographer ), what amazed me was the baby sharks patrolling literally a few inches from shore, these were probably no bigger than 12"-14":
> 
> there was an air-taxi jetty with a coffee house on the end where rays came to feed, wish i had some photos of that. Did you see any turtles?
> ...


 
Awesome Ady, Its pretty cool to see that no matter where you go there you get a very similar experience. We were at Vihamanafushi (don't ask me how to pronounce that!) in the North Male Atoll which is about 20 minute boat ride from the airport. Our particular island didn't have any of the cool water villas or huge sand but it did have its own house reef.

Heres a 'Jaws' moment to add to your shark collection ;






I didn't see any turtles personally but my other half did. We went for a trip to a sandbank in the middle of nowhere provided with a picnic, chest of beers (as you do) and a couple of umbrellas. We did more snorkelling whilst we were there and there were a few more things to see on the reef dropoff.

I just loved that I'd never been diving or snorkelling before and this was just so accessible and relaxing. The only things we needed to keep an eye out for were urchins and triggerfish. Most of my day was doing laps of the island snorkelling with a pitstop in each of the two beach bars.

I wish I was there!


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## Ian Holdich (12 Jun 2013)

Ady is like a Ukaps version of a Chipindale...


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## Mr. Teapot (12 Jun 2013)

Great to see the everyone's pictures of the Maldives - brought back my memories of my holiday a couple of years ago. When we came back I really wanted to set up a salty tank. Often thought it would be cool to have three small tanks of the same size next to each other... planted, brackish/mangrove and then marine. 

Some of my pictures:


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## DrRob (12 Jun 2013)

Velidhu island here, on the North Ari atoll.


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## DrRob (12 Jun 2013)

Ok Mr Teapot, your underwater camera is far, far better than the disposable rubbish, although mine were from 7 years ago.


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## Mr. Teapot (12 Jun 2013)

It was a nice little camera - an underwater canon powershot. Really impressed when I got it home and looked at the photos on screen. I took it down to about 7-8m with the turtle pic. Loved freediving down and swimming around for a bit but didn't get down far enough for any negative buoyancy, which I reckon would be about 10m for me, I just couldn't equalise the pressure in my ears... maybe next time!


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## sciencefiction (12 Jun 2013)

I just can't resist.
Here are a few pictures of the place we stayed in Thailand:

A few of the bungalow we stayed in:




And an overall view of the resort.




Me sitting in the bar next to our beach taking pictures(yes we were so lazy)








This was full of guppies and they had all type of little ponds like that around the place.




And the kois posing for a picture:




Sunrise in our resort:








And a view from our entire beach where we stayed. The bungalows were meters away from the beach down there.


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## NeilW (12 Jun 2013)

Loving the photos guys, paradise. Great parrotfish shot!


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## NeilW (12 Jun 2013)

It inspired me to want to setup a nicely aquascaped marine tank with humbug damselfish and white coral sand.


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## Vanish (12 Jun 2013)

I went in 2010 to club faru. It was an awesome holiday. I only have to mention that 'M' word and the Missus get all exited. Where we were they had inclusive trips on the dhovi to a reef that was about 30 mins from the island. And yeah the food was great. I got fat in two weeks!


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## matt (12 Jun 2013)

I went to meeru island about 8 years ago now, best holiday I've ever had and would love to go back one day.I have many photos but all on old school film so can't post.
And yes the food is was amazing,remember eating snapper fish curry for breakfast,ummm.


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## Ady34 (12 Jun 2013)

NeilW said:


> Heres a 'Jaws' moment to add to your shark collection ;


think i would have muddied the water if i saw one that big 



NeilW said:


> I just loved that I'd never been diving or snorkelling before and this was just so accessible and relaxing. The only things we needed to keep an eye out for were urchins and triggerfish. Most of my day was doing laps of the island snorkelling with a pitstop in each of the two beach bars.


yeah im not a strong swimmer, and hadnt done any snorkeling before but it was great because like you say it was so accessible and you could do it at your leisure. The triggerfish were massive if i remember right with menacing looking beaks  The bar was less menacing and more welcoming 

@ Mr. Teapot, great photos too 




Ian Holdich said:


> Ady is like a Ukaps version of a Chipindale...


 ........ 7 years of married bliss and 2 kids has me more like a fish 'n' chipendale now  .... i reckon if i could go back to the Maldives id eat much more of the lovely food offered


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## DrRob (13 Jun 2013)

I'm a terrible swimmer, but a lot of that has to do with buoyancy, which isn't an issue diving, and it turns out that I have a very powerful stroke (probably designed to keep me on the surface in normal swimming) so diving and snorkelling are actually easier for me. I have free dived down to about 12 metres (when I dropped my wedding ring in the red sea) which tends to annoy the trainee divers when you swim past them from below and wave.

We didn't get turtle shots as the stupid camera broke just before one can within about a metre of us and sat and checked us out.

As for sharks, the biggest I've swum with was a tiger shark, and that wasn't intentional and resulted in an aborted diving trip pretty quickly. Those things are terrifying.


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## stu_ (14 Jun 2013)

I'm not.
I repeat not.
At all envious....


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