Maldives Tour 2012 – Day 3: Paradise Island / The Haven

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Paradise Island - tour post

Just a literal (or should I saw ‘littoral’) stone’s throw away, we proceed onto Paradise Island / The Haven.

We’ve have been very close to visiting Paradise (the resort, not the notion) several other times before. A few years back when the family was seeking out a more value-for-money place, it made the short-list. And subsequent North Male visits took us to Manta Point for diving which is just off Paradise’s house reef.

Paradise pioneered the concept of the split personality island. Where a newer part of the island, typically water villas, are developed to a significantly higher standard than the rest of the resort. Often an entire ‘star’ difference (eg. 4-star and 5-star). Now over half a dozen resorts have this sort of ‘split’ set up. Often the adjacent properties have completely distinct branding, logistics, service, etc. This trend was just one reason the contributed to the development of Room Type database to provide people with more granular information on possible destinations. Just a profile on a resort as a whole doesn’t really tell the whole story of what’s on offer.

One of my discoveries was that The Haven water villas allow children of any age. Pretty much all of the water bungalows that I know of have restrictions against children staying there for safety reasons of them falling into the water. The policy at the Haven is to firmly warn the guests of the risks and if they do want to still stay there with children, then they are allowed to do so. This flexibility will be very welcome to families looking for the water villa experience but often restricted from doing so.

Another aspect of a big island is that it often sits on a big lagoon table making the house reef hard to reach and the snorkelling less exciting. But, as duly logged in Snorkel Spotter, we had a delightful snorkel seeing a shark, sting ray and more lion fish in one little rocky overhang (about a dozen) than we had ever seen.

I uncovered a further 6 Best of the Maldives candidates during my stay to add to the 2 already done. Great to finally make it all the way to Paradise after so many close callings.

 

Paradise Island - lion fish

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Best of the Maldives: Glass Bottom Boat – Paradise Island / Conrad Maldives Rangali

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Paradise Island - glass bottom boat

Unparalleled snorkelling and work class diving aren’t the only way to explore all of these QI curiosities in the Maldives. If you don’t want to spoil your finely coiffed ‘do, then consider a glass bottomed boat excursion. A number of resorts offer them – Reethi Beach, Kurumba, Baros, Conrad Rangali, Paradise Island, Coco Palm Dhuni Kolhu and Taj Vivanta Coral Reef.

But the top of the line in this unique class of ocean vessels is the Paritetboat brand which both Paradise Island (photo above) and Conrad Maldives Rangali (photo below) feature.

“Paritetboat company developed unique ultra-durable bottom window shaped as an optically regular spheroid of never seen before size 2×3 m – it is the biggest size all over the world. Our glass is made of modified acrylic and has thickness 15 mm it’s more solid than fiber glass boat hull. It allows to enlarge field of view dozens times as compared to ordinary glass bottom boats. For instance, field of view at 9 meter depth is half basketball playground size.”

 

Conrad Maldives Rangali - glass bottom boat

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Best of the Maldives: Mantas – The Haven

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Manta YouTube

Possibly one of the most placidly dramatic aquatic encounters in the Maldives is the graceful and commanding creature Manta Ray. Quite prevalent across most of the Maldives, we have seen them a number of times from shore. In fact, Conrad Hilton Rangali had a regular manta visitor who came every evening like clockwork to feed on the small sea life attracted by the lights of the dock. The resort guests would go down to watch the balletic display of this spaceship-like fish doing loop-the-loops underwater scooping up big mouthfuls (see picture below we snapped).

The YouTube clip above is from a National Geographic piece on Mantas in the Maldives which has great pictures and commentary. It provides good tips on ‘when’ to see Mantas (and other large pelagics like Whale Sharks). Unfortunately, the ‘best’ time for pelagic is the ‘worst’ time for weather, ie. the monsoon season. The seasonal rains spur the growth of the microscopic food on which these filter feeds feast.

The top spot for Mantas is the eponymous ‘Manta Point’ (see dive chart below) near The Haven resort. Tim Godfrey’s ‘Dive Maldives’ book describes,

  • “Manta Point has a world-wide reputation as being one of the most consistent sites for attracting large numbers of manta ray…In eight metres of water on the south east corner of Lanaknfinolhu reef are several large coral rocks which mark the point where mantas converge during the south-west monsoon season. Mantas have been photographed here as early as April and as late as December. These rocks are one giant cleaner station for the mantas. Blue-streak cleaner wrasse, Labroides dimidiatus, often working in pairs, can be observed swimming out to the hovering mantas to remove old skin and parasites. The mantas circle the rocks awaiting their turn to be cleaned and when finished they swim gracefully up and down the reef feeding on zooplankton in the shallow water.”

If you can’t make it to Manta Point, but still want to regale in a spectacular show of these majestic creatures in the Maldives, MaldivesComplete has the scoop that BBC2 will broadcast ‘Andrea: Queen of Mantas’ on Wednesday 11 November 8 pm (if you do not live in the UK, check out the BBC iPlayer website to see if and when the programme will be broadcast over the Internet which many of their shows are now).

  • “Andrea: Queen of the Mantas tracks student Andrea Marshall over the course of a year as she dives the Indian Ocean unlocking secrets about the manta ray – a balletic cousin to the shark, with ‘wings’ which can span 7 metres (20 ft) wide…[R]evelations in the film include…the first tv footage of around 150 mantas massing near the Maldives…[in conjunction with the show] an online campaign seeking better safeguards for sharks and mantas is being run by The Save Our Seas Foundation, a main sponsor of manta ray research in Mozambique and around the Maldives.”

Rangali Manta

The Haven Dive Chart

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